Soft Mysteries
by Kittenshift17
Summary: "The war is inevitable Hermione, and you need to know that when it breaks out properly I'll have to walk away as though you mean nothing to me. I won't like it, but I'll do it if it means me and my family get to stay alive. But until then…Until then... I fancy you Hermione. Every time I see you I can't keep my eyes off you and my hands itch to touch you. I want to be with you."
1. Lime Blossoms

**Soft Mysteries**

_Lime Blossoms_

**Draco** Malfoy couldn't believe his eyes as he stared at the girl in the floaty periwinkle-blue dress robes on the arm of the most famous Seeker in the wizarding world right now. On his own arm pug-faced Pansy Parkinson stared in unflattering open-mouthed shock at the surprisingly pretty looking girl, though Draco kept his cool exterior from wrinkling or even showing the slightest hint at all that he knew Hermione Granger existed. That didn't mean that he didn't feel like he was seeing her for the very first time. Gone was the bushy mane of hair that so often made him think of a grizzly bear shedding its winter coat, gone were the beaver-like buck teeth that he had long teased her for. In their place were sleekness and a shy sweet smile. Her brown eyes seemed to twinkle with mystery, and the pale blue of her dress robes added a sensual softness to her body that had not been there before tonight. Everyone from Hogwarts who knew her personally, as well as those who only knew of her, was staring at her in shock and Draco instantly recognised desire in the eyes of many of his male peers. Tonight Hermione Granger didn't look like a flustered, ugly being with her nose stuck in a book or her arm stuck in the air; tonight she looked the picture of a beautiful girl teetering on the cusp of womanhood, the innocence in her shy smile, the secrecy in her sparkling brown eyes and the sensual poise of her body shrouding her in an air of mysterious virginal innocence, sweet and ripe for the tasting.

For the first time in his life Draco Malfoy was actually seeing Hermione Granger as a girl, not as a Mudblood or a bossy little know-it-all, not even as a bookworm. Right now she was just a girl, beautiful and desirable, wearing a timid smile while her eyes seemed to twinkle with secrets. But he was Draco Malfoy and she was far beneath him, not even worth his notice, even if seeing her look so beautiful did make his breath catch in his throat. As he led Pansy past the couple, he noticed the way Potter stared at the girl as though he too was seeing her for the first time, and Malfoy made sure to curl his lips back in a smug sneer when Pansy actually turned and gaped over her shoulder at the girl in the blue dress. Tonight he couldn't think of a single insult to throw at her and so he merely smirked as she defiantly met his gaze and lifted her chin in anticipation of his latest insult.

He enjoyed watching the way she seemed to flounder inside her head for just a moment before deflating like a punctured balloon when no snide comment or cutting remark met her waiting ears. Draco rolled his eyes when he watched the Weasel walk right by the pretty girl without even noticing her; _dim-witted bastard_!

"Am I seeing things or is that really Granger on Viktor Krum's arm?" Pansy hissed to him as he led her over to the table at the edge of the room where the rest of the Slytherin fourth-years sat waiting for this stupid Yule Ball to begin with the Champions big entry so they could eat. Draco didn't deem to answer her, instead choosing merely to stare down his nose at the much shorter girl and roll his eyes as though she were as stupid as the Weasel.

"Why would someone like him bring _that_ to the ball as his date?" Pansy sneered in disgust when she realised she had said the wrong thing by even acknowledging that the girl existed. It took everything he had not to just Silence the stupid pug-faced bint hanging off his arm and attempting to bask in the prowess that came with his being a Malfoy, but their father's often did business together and it would not do to offend her. His father would grow angry if he were to hear of such things.

All through the dinner Malfoy kept his eyes trained on Granger while managing to make it look as though he was completely bored with the proceedings and even managing to join in as the rest of his classmates jeered at the unfortunate dress robes some of the students had picked out. He made certain to draw attention to Weasley's atrocious robes, earning snide laughter aimed at the ginger from all around the table. But none of this acting managed to draw his eye away from Granger for long and he watched he as she chatted amicably with the Bulgarian Seeker, chuckling internally as he saw he trying to teach the surly Quidditch player how to pronounce her mouthful of a name.

All night long he watched her, noticing the way Weasley kept glaring at Hermione as she danced happily with Krum, and the way she fanned herself with her hands when the International Quidditch Champion left her with her friends and disappeared somewhere. Malfoy smirked from the place where he lurked with Crabbe and Goyle, as he heard the malice in the ginger haired weasel's tone as he attacked Granger for whatever she had just said to them. It amused him immensely as she let herself be drawn into yet another argument with the easily angered boy and he marvelled with a sense of mild disgust at the way in which they both so openly showed their emotions. Such arguments weren't a thing seen among Slytherins and certainly never among Pureblood's.

Showing any kind of emotional reaction to anything gave anyone who saw that reaction power; and if there was one thing Draco Malfoy never did, it was to let anyone think they had any kind of power or superiority over him. But in spite of himself he found he couldn't look away as he watched the jealous red-haired loser argue with the pretty witch, subconsciously giving away that he was hurt and jealous over Hermione being on the arm of anyone who wasn't him, though Draco knew the Weasel hadn't actually asked Granger to be his date. That much was obvious in the way he hadn't noticed Hermione was Krum's date until he'd found her missing from the table as he ate like an untrained dog, devouring his food angrily and with no sense of decorum at all.

From his viewing place, Draco could tell that Granger was completely baffled by the ginger's attack even though she continued to allow herself to be drawn into the argument as she fought him on each other the weak points he threw at her as he tried to distract her from the truth. Draco watched her blush at something the ginger said and he found himself beginning to smirk wickedly at the feelings that blush stirred within him when they combined with her snapping, secretive eyes. Draco and his associates sniggered as the argument between the two grew so heated that Weasley started to shout before Granger leapt to her feet and stormed away, her eyes sparkling with fury as she stalked across the dance floor. Draco found himself admiring the almost predatory gait of self-assuredness and anger that transformed her regular stomping into a swift, lithe stalk. She even managed to keep from stumbling in her high heels.

Throughout the evening Draco danced with Pansy a couple of times, though tonight he wasn't much interested in the way she fawned over him so he didn't even pretend to listen as she droned on and on about nonsense. When the Weird Sisters finished their last song at midnight, students began wending their way out of the hall and off towards their respective houses and beds, but Draco wasn't around to watch them. Instead he had slipped off into one of the corridors on the fifth floor, using a secret passageway to get there, knowing it came out on the most direct path to Gryffindor Tower and knowing that Granger was now not speaking to Weasley, and probably not to Potter either.

If he was being honest he had no idea why he'd come. All he knew was that when he'd watched Krum press his lips to the back of Granger's pale hand to bid her goodnight, something had roared to life inside his chest and sent his feet stealthily to the path of the secret passageway. He lingered behind a statue on the fifth floor across from the entry to the passageway, keeping out of sight as several Gryffindors went past and he stayed there until he saw a familiar figure stalking down the corridor. By some miracle the corridor was deserted as Granger stormed along it and Draco couldn't help but smirk at the way she appeared to be muttering to herself. On silent feet with the reflexes and stealth of a seeker, Draco shot out from his hiding place as Granger came in line with his statue. Using his superior strength and height to overpower the unsuspecting girl, Draco wrapped his hand around her face to stifle her scream as he dragged her into the secret passageway, pinning her arms against her sides with his other arm, and he winced when she stomped down hard on his foot with the point of her heel.

He still didn't know what he was doing here. All he knew was that the feel of having her pressed against his torso like this as she struggled to fight free of him was making his heart beat a little faster and appeasing the beast that had roared to life inside his chest downstairs. She smelled like lilies and lilacs and Draco caught a whiff of the sweet scent of the moonflower. Almost immediately his mind flashed images of each flower and drew upon the knowledge his mother had taught him about the meanings of flowers. He wondered if Hermione knew that the three scents she wore symbolised innocence and dreams of first love all combined with the spicy scent of orange lilies which spoke of passion and desire and hatred. All he knew was that all but one of them was drawing him in and he couldn't keep from sliding his nose along the curve of her neck as he breathed in the sweet scents, his arms still clamped tightly around her and his body suddenly pulsing with a desire to taste forbidden fruit.

**Hermione** tried to scream and fight free of whoever had hold of her but strong arms held her against a hard chest with an unrelenting grip. Even when she slammed the pointed spike of her high heel on her attacker's toe, she only managed to make them grunt. She had no idea who had hold of her, but the fact that the person had dragged her into a deserted secret passageway where no one could see them made Hermione nervous and she struggled against the arm that had managed to pin both of hers to her side, while the other covered her mouth and stifled her screams. Silently she cursed herself for leaving her wand in her dormitory tonight, foolishly believing that tonight would be magical and wonderful and that there would be no call for having to defend herself.

But Hermione stopped struggling when she felt her attacker run their nose gently down the skin at her neck, inhaling the scents of her perfume. Suddenly Hermione realised that this abduction could involve a lot more than wanting to hurt her and Hermione froze as that idea sent a wave of terror through her, setting her already pounding heart racing with newfound speed as panic took hold of her. Who on earth would think to attack her? And even more terrifyingly, who would be such a creep about it?

Standing completely still even though her body wanted to leap into a fighting frenzy so she could try to escape, Hermione held her breath as he attacker's nose skimmed up and down her slender neck in the dimly lit, dark passage. Warm breath blew against her skin as her captor exhaled before inhaling another deep whiff of the scents on her skin. Goose pimples raced across Hermione's skin and she wasn't entirely certain whether they sprang from fear or desire as the arms around her relaxed fractionally now that she wasn't wildly fighting for her freedom.

"Do you know you smell of innocence and passion and desire?" her captor murmured huskily into her ear, his warm breath caressing the sensitive shell of her ear even as his soft lips brushed ever so gently against her. "But the flowers you smell of also represent dreams of first love, and the orange lily might speak of desire and passion but it also speaks of hatred. Did you know that?"

Hermione felt herself shiver violently in her captor's arms even as she tried to pinpoint the owner of the wicked voice.

"Let me go!" she tried to say but it came out sounding like muffled moans instead of words and she heard his breath catch as she shuddered again. The boy who had hold of her made no move to release her, even when Hermione tried to stomp on his foot again and missed. Her breath hissed in through her nose in surprise and outrage when she felt lips pressed against the sensitive skin of her neck. The trail of kisses burned as silky soft lips sent spikes of desire shooting off into her body and wakening parts of her that she hadn't quite believed truly existed and melting away her urge to escape or even resist. Hermione was thankful for the hand clamped over her mouth when she moaned as he bit down gently on the sweet spot of her throat. His tongue flicked against it lightly and this time a shiver accompanied the moan he elicited from her. He didn't speak, but Hermione knew that whoever it was that had hold of her, was smirking smugly.

When she relaxed back against his hard chest he loosened his hold on her, hand slipping down away from her face to trail sensual shapes against her exposed if modest cleavage with his fingertips. All the while he kept kissing her neck, sucking and nibbling at the sensitive flesh and even when her mouth was uncovered Hermione made no move call for help or protest his attentions. Instead she let her head fall backwards to rest of his shoulder, granting him full access to her neck and completely surrendering to the skilful ministrations of his lips and tongue against her throat. Another moan escaped her when he drew her flesh into his mouth and sucked it tenderly, drawing the blood to the surface as he marked her flawless skin.

There was a small part of her with a particularly loud voice that was revelling in the mystery of not knowing who could make her feel like this, in the sensual secrecy of being pulled into a hidden corridor kissed so intimately. That part of her didn't want to know who this wonderful boy was, didn't want to ruin the magic of this moment with reality and so she complied to his whispered request.

"Close your eyes, Hermione?"

**Draco** felt himself genuinely smile at the way she had completely surrendered beneath his lips and he watched the way her eyelids fluttered close at his request. He still couldn't believe he was doing this, but with every touch of his skin to hers, the beast inside his chest purred in satisfaction. Very slowly he stepped out from behind her, liking the way she kept her eyes closed, keeping his identity a mystery as he made her feel things she was sure no other had ever made her feel. When he stood in front of her, he peered down into her pretty face for a moment, taking both her hands and lacing her fingers with his as he brought them up above her head and laid her body out like a feast for his eyes as he gently pushed her back against the wall. Leaning into her, he liked the way her soft curves moulded to his hard body and he watched her bite her bottom lip sensually at whatever he was making her feel.

Slowly, his body responding to hers in ways he'd never imagined it would and making him realise he'd never be able to watch her bite her lip in class the same way, Draco lowered his face until in hovered directly above hers. She was holding her breath in anticipation and he felt his own heart racing inside his chest because he was about to do the unthinkable. Throwing everything he had been taught since birth about his superiority to the wind Draco Malfoy let his grey eyes slide closed and leaned into Hermione Granger. His lips brushed over hers lightly and he marvelled at the silkiness of her lips. He knew she'd never kissed another boy before, but it was his little secret that he was giving his first kiss to her too.

Draco smiled as Hermione pressed herself into him, pushing up from the wall and deepening their feather-light kiss, her lips caressing his as they moved together. Not entirely sure of what he was doing, Draco let his tongue flick out to brush lightly against the seam of her lips and he smiled wider as she granted him access to her warm mouth. Tentatively her tongue flicked out to meet his and he realised she was as nervous as he was. But he'd seen plenty of the older students kissing when Slytherin won at Quidditch so he had a vague idea of how to do this. Pressing against her as his stomach did a somersault, Draco massaged her tongue tenderly with his. His fingers interlocked with hers high above her head where he held her hands against the wall, began to knead hers as the passion and desire in him began to build.

**Hermione **still didn't know who was kissing her and even though this was her very first kiss she didn't much care to find out who this boy was. Not right now. Not while he was kissing her with such tender care. In that moment she truly understood the idea of sharing herself with another as his tongue swept against hers and sent spirals of stabbing desire and unbearable sweetness through her entire body, all of them seeming to be headed for a secret place beneath her abdomen. She marvelled at the mysterious feelings inside her and at the softness of his lips against hers when the rest of his body seemed so hard as he pressed her against the wall so deliciously. With both of their arms high above their heads she could feel the tight muscles of his stomach and chest beneath his dress robes as he moved against her and Hermione was tempted to open her eyes and find out who belonged to this deliciously hard body and skilfully sweet lips.

But she held herself in check, keeping her eyes closed even when her lover tenderly broke away from their sugary kiss, leaving her gasping for breath. Slowly he lowered their hands and stepped back from her slightly but Hermione kept her eyes close, hoping he would tell her to open them. She was dying now to know who had kissed her with such tender expertise and she jumped slightly when he leaned back in and pressed a kiss to her forehead before releasing her hands and stepping back from her completely. She was still leaning against the wall he had pressed her into when she heard the soft sound of footsteps and Hermione opened her eyes. In the dimly lit passageway Hermione watched the boy she'd been kissing begin to hurry away and she stared at his black dress robes as she called out in protest.

"Who…?" but Hermione never finished her question because just as she spoke the boy stopped and glanced over his shoulder. He had a smirk in place and his grey eyes seemed to catch the light from the outside corridor beyond the entryway to the passage. Hermione stood dumbstruck as she took in the white blonde hair and smirking features of Draco Malfoy. Surely she must be having a nightmare. Surely this was all a cruel trick someone had played on her, someone else having kissed her and then stepped out, having Malfoy step in to pretend he'd been the one to kiss her instead. But as Hermione's brown eyes locked onto his grey ones, she knew there was no mistake. She knew she'd just surrendered her first kiss to her arch nemesis, and what a kiss it had been. Hermione feared she'd never be able to look at him or at herself in quite the same way ever again. As if seeking to confirm her fears Malfoy winked at her and his husky voice murmured;

"I'll see you in class, Granger."


	2. Lobelia

******A/N: Thanks for the reviews. Hope you like the new chapter. xx-Kitten.**

**Lobelia**

The trouble with Forbidden Fruit, Draco Malfoy decided sourly, was that one taste was never enough. It was all he could do not to glare at the bushy haired girl he hadn't seen in months from across the gloomy potions classroom. Seven months it had been since he had so inexplicably followed her, jumped her and kissed her like a madman and now they were in a different school year. From the minute he'd spotted her in the prefects compartment on the Hogwarts Express, Draco had noticed several things about Hermione Granger. She'd grown taller and had begun to fill out into the more defined curves of a woman, her waist dipping lower, the swell of her breasts and hips a little more pronounced; her hair seemed a little more under control than it had in previous years, hanging a little longer and falling in long loose ringlets rather than a mane of bushiness.

He didn't know what it was about the irritating, bossy little know-it-all of a mudblood, but since last year's Yule Ball, Draco hadn't been able to look at her quite the same way. Which was how he came to be staring at her with hooded desire masked by boredom as he watched her bite her bottom lip and peer into her cauldron. Before the summer Draco had often found himself distracted in class whenever he caught sight of Granger biting her bottom lip, because every single time he spotted her doing it he was taken right back to that night in the dimly lit passage, with her arms extended above her head, her body laid out like a banquet for his personal enjoyment as she bit her lip in anticipation of his kiss.

Since that night when he'd dragged her into the passage and tenderly stolen away her first kiss, Granger had not once mentioned a word to him about the entire incident. He was absolutely certain that she'd never told a soul what they'd done, and he often enjoyed the way she blushed just a little bit if she ever met his eyes unintentionally. The one other time he'd found himself alone with her last year she had completely ignored him, pretending he didn't exist even when he taunted her and insulted her. He'd thought he might be able to forget about that night during the summer when he didn't have to see her biting that damned bottom lip in class every day, and he'd been partially successful. But now here she was, looking a little more decent than she had done last year and carrying that secret around in her eyes while biting her damn lip!

Draco startled when a sharp grip seized his wrist and he dragged his eyes and mind away from Hermione Granger's lips to glare up into the black eyes of his godfather. Snape was glaring right back at him and he squeezed Draco's wrist hard enough to hurt, clearly if silently warning him to pay better attention to what he was doing since he had been about to up end the entire contents of his syrup of Hellebor into his potion. Snape's black eyes flashed warningly and Draco nodded his head to indicate that he understood. He didn't even breathe again until Snape had walked away; sincerely hoping that Snape didn't know he'd been staring at Granger. It simply wouldn't do to have anyone think that anything other than utter hatred and degradation had ever passed between him and the mudblood.

In spite of the warnings he gave himself he couldn't help but glancing at her on a regular basis. Sometimes he even wondered why she was always so insufferable and so incapable of restraining herself whenever a question was presented to the class. But the day dragged on and at lunch Malfoy swallowed back an evil smirk when the Head Girl handed him a copy of the prefect duty roster. There in neatly organised and colour-coded boxes was the patrol roster of all the prefects and it seemed that some idiot had seen fit to pair him with Granger four nights a week for the entire term. His lip curled in disgust and anticipation of being alone in the darkness of the castle late at night with the book-worm that he hadn't fully been able to get out of his head since the night she surrendered to him so sweetly and had kissed him with such tender, willing desire.

The image flashed in his mind of his arms wrapped around her, his fingertips writing the letters of his name across her cleavage as she moaned in pleasure and let her head drop back onto his shoulder at the feel of his lips against his throat. Draco clenched his fist around his fork as he ate his lunch and the images from his memory filled his mind, making him want to do it all over again.

**Hermione **was nervous. At lunch she'd been given her duty roster and the idea of being alone with Malfoy all evening as they were expected to patrol the halls together was only a step above terrifying. Sometimes, when she was alone her mind flashed back to that Christmas night unbidden as she thought of her first kiss, and every time it happened Hermione asked herself the same question. Why?

Why had he done it? What could have possibly possessed Draco Malfoy to lurk in a hallway, lying in wait in order to attack her and drag her into a secret passageway late at night? He hated her, he always had and he probably always would. So why had he pulled her into the passageway and stolen away her first kiss? A thousand times Hermione had run the questions through her mind, inventing all kinds of scenarios that might explain his behaviour. In some she imagined that he'd intended to hurt her only to be overcome with lust; in others he had whispered ridiculous things into her ears.

For several weeks after it happened Hermione had been paranoid and terrified that he would tell everyone; that it would somehow get out that Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy had kissed after the Yule Ball. Every day for weeks she'd gotten out of bed terrified that her friends would learn the truth and look at her in disgust. In such a scenarios she'd often imagined that she would explain it away as him attacking her in an inexplicable frenzy, but she knew such an argument would be a lie. True he had attacked her and dragged her in there unwillingly, but when he'd released her she hadn't sought to discover his identity immediately. Instead she had surrendered to the startling and intense feeling he had been provoking within her and let a complete stranger kiss her.

When she had discovered it was him who had kissed her and made her feel all of those wonderful things, Hermione had been mortified. When she'd gone to bed she had cast a silencing ward around her bed so none of the other girls would hear her scream her frustration and confusion into her pillow. Because it wasn't fair that he had stolen away her first kiss. A first kiss was supposed to be given to someone you were in love with. It was supposed to be tender and loving, a gift to give to a lover, sharing herself with another in a magical, wonderful moment of blissful abandon. True Love First Kiss was a magical phenomenon she'd read about in her muggle childhood, and hers had been stolen away. Hermione chastised herself; he hadn't stolen it. Not really. He may have dragged her into the passage and held her captive at first, but as she'd stood there willingly letting him pin her to the wall as he hesitated to kiss her, Hermione had yearned to give her first kiss to the boy who could make her feel so alive with a single touch.

And Hermione kind of hated that fact. Because her first kiss had been everything she had always imagined it would be; timid, tender, filled with passion and desire that left her longing for more. It hadn't been an expression of love but as she'd stood there locking lips with a mystery man, she'd fantasised about falling in love with whoever could kiss her so wonderfully. And then she'd opened her eyes to face the cruel reality that the boy who had made her feel so wonderful was the boy who had spent the past four years making her feel awful. How could life be so unfair as to make her first kiss absolutely perfect, only to tear away any childish dreams for love and happiness by making the boy who been her first kiss Draco Malfoy?

For a week after that encounter Hermione had walked around with her head in a storm-cloud. She'd used a Concealment Charm to hide the love bit her had left on her throat from her friends and peers, and she was caught somewhere between floating happily at having such a dreamy first kiss, and raging mad because it had been with Malfoy. A million times she'd fantasised about confronting him and demanding an explanation, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of knowing he'd gotten to her. She might not be able to keep the blush from her cheeks if she ever accidently met his gaze, but she sure as sugar wasn't going to let him know that he'd made her feel anything.

"Fantasising about me Granger" Malfoy's hissed from the shadows and Hermione fought not to jump in surprise when she realised that the ferret-faced boy she'd been waiting for was sitting next to her on the stone windowsill in the dark. She didn't know how he'd manage to sneak up on her, especially when she'd been lost in thoughts about him, but she didn't like it. If she'd been nervous about being alone with him before he got here, Hermione was downright worried now. He was sitting next to her on the windowsill, quite close to her, close enough that if she moved at all her elbow would probably brush against his. It was a wonder his thigh wasn't pressed against hers, he sat so close.

"No. Ferrets aren't really my type" Hermione said scathingly, suddenly finding the anger and irritation Harry and Ron had expected from her earlier when she found out about this little arrangement. Malfoy chuckled wickedly from next to her in the darkness and Hermione wondered how he had snuck up on her without sparking the motion-censored torches along the walls.

"Sure you weren't Granger" he murmured in that evil husky voice he had used to seduce her in the first place. Hermione shuddered in revulsion but he wasn't done "I'll bet you fantasised about me all summer… Maybe not everyday… but I'll bet that every now and then when you had nothing but time to dwell on your thoughts, your mind drifted to me." Damn him for that murmuring husky voice! Even just hearing it sent her straight back to that night as he'd asked her to close her eyes and said her first name for the first time.

"Something you'd like to get off your chest, Malfoy?" Hermione asked him, glaring into his grey eyes with all the hatred and anger she'd felt for him since that night. He just chuckled darkly and got to his feet, striding off down the corridor on silent feet, several of the torches flaring to life and casting long shadows on the walls.

"I've already done this floor." Hermione said softly as she watched him walk away from her. They'd agreed to meet on the fourth floor since it was closest to the middle for both of them from their House Common Rooms. She watched Malfoy stop before he turned right around and came back crossing his arms over his chest and glaring down at where she still sat on the windowsill.

"Do you know what we're actually supposed to do here?" Hermione clarified after a while of watching him impatiently tap his toe. He gave a sharp nod when Hermione looked up at him and she bit her bottom lip nervously as she met his steely grey eyes. She could feel the blush blossoming on her cheeks as he gazed back at her and she saw something flash in his eyes at the movement.

"I don't suppose you checked all the floors on the way down here?" he asked her in that same husky murmur that made Hermione clench her fists.

"You checked all the floor on the way up here to meet me?" Hermione asked, astonished. He gave another sharp nod. "We're supposed to split up and patrol the corridors."

Malfoy shook his head "That defeats the purpose Granger. There are two pairs of Prefects rostered on for a reason. Tonight it's you and me as well as Goldstein and Abbott. The instructions say we're supposed to patrol in pairs for two hours after nine to make sure that there aren't any students out of bed."

Hermione raised her eyebrows at him. Was he really going to insist they patrol in pairs?

"Are you worried a first year might get the better of you and tell you to stuff it Malfoy?" Hermione asked mockingly.

"Granger for eight hours a week for the entire term I get you all to myself to torment, insult and otherwise degrade. Now why would I pass that kind of opportunity up?" his grey eyes flashed malevolently and Hermione heard the threatening overtone in his voice as he spoke. But she refused to let him get a rise out of her and instead slid off the windowsill and got to her feet. Her robes hung about her and Hermione straightened her skirt before she looked up.

When she did she almost stumbled backwards in surprise. Malfoy hadn't moved backwards from his place in front of her when she'd moved to stand, and Hermione swallowed her gasp of nervous surprise when she found herself nose to nose with the sinister blonde boy. Standing this close to him Hermione realised how much they had both grown over the summer. He towered over her five foot five by several inches, the top of her head directly in line with his mouth. Being this close to him brought memories of that night flooding back and Hermione tried to keep him from realising that she was taking a deep breath in through her nose. She didn't want him to know that the scent of his skin, mint and warm oak combined with a hint of sweat, were scents she'd subconsciously come to associate with desire since he was still the only boy she'd ever kissed.

Defiantly Hermione tipped her head back until she could stare into his grey eyes. He glared down at her, less than three inches separating their faces and Hermione couldn't keep from biting her lip as she remembered the last time she had been this close to him. Sexual tension flared to life between them as she glared up into his flint grey eyes and Hermione watched the way they flashed wildly. His expression never changed as he wore that unreadable expression that was somewhere between a smirk and a sneer, but Hermione knew he was feeling the tension between them just as much as she was. That same small part of her with the loud voice that had kept her eyes closed last time was now voicing the opinion very loudly that Hermione ought to kiss him again.

But she was Hermione Granger and she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of knowing he made he feel anything other than disgust. Being that he was Draco Malfoy, Hermione suspected he was just as stubborn and that he certainly wouldn't want the mudblood with the audacity to glare up at him in such close proximity to know that she made him feel anything other than disgust either.

**Draco** didn't know how long they stood there in the corridor glaring at each other. He knew it was long enough that the torches that had flared to life as he'd tried to walk away from her, had all fizzled out again, casting them back into tense darkness. A part of him was appalled that she clearly had no fear of him, for if she did she certainly wouldn't hold his gaze while standing within striking distance. But the beast inside his chest that had so riled him up last year was sitting up and pricking it's ears at the sweet scents on her skin. She smelled the same as she had that night and it was driving him wild with desire. He wanted nothing more than to throw her against the wall and have his way with her, but Draco squashed the thought as soon as it reared its head. That was not a thought that was permitted within his head. He might have entertained the idea of kissing her again after he had done so in a moment of foolishness last Christmas, but he had no business feeling anything that wasn't sneering repugnance for the girl glaring up at him. He especially had no business entertaining any kind of idea that portrayed Granger in a way that was desirable.

Even if she did smell incredible. Even if there was something about the secrets that seemed to set her brown eyes snapping so fiercely, that made him want to bury his hands in her wavy mane of hair and secure her face to his so he could taste her lips again. Once again he found himself coming right back to the thought he'd had in potions earlier today. Forbidden fruit was far too enticing to only be tasted once. And if there was ever anyone or anything in his life that could be considered to be forbidden fruit it was the girl in front him.

She was a mudblood, she was a Gryffindor, she was a know-it-all little bookworm, too smart for her own good and absolutely off limits to someone like him. She was beneath him. Draco smirked just a little at the idea of having her literally beneath him. After all, forbidden fruit once tasted will ultimately be devoured. He watched Granger try not to react to his smirk and trying to keep from reacting in any way to the sexual tension snapping between them like wildfire. She might be forbidden for all the things his father had taught were wrong with people like her, but for all that she was fierce and independent and apparently had absolutely no fear of what he might do to her in a dark deserted corridor after hours.

That made her foolish. He'd already showed her some of the things he liked to do in the dark, and before this night was through he might just have to remind her of them.

**Hermione** stayed still even when he smirked wickedly, even when the lamps fizzled out because neither of them had moved in so long. It was a battle of wills to prove that neither was affected by the tension leaping between them and she wasn't going to lose. Even if he did smell desirable and the wicked smirk on his face told her that he was clearly thinking impure thoughts about her.

"We should start with the library." Hermione told him, finally breaking the extended silence when she noted the way he was clenching and unclenching his fists at his sides. Hermione hid her smile when she watched him blink in confusion for just a moment. She brushed past him, purposely letting her breasts brush against his chest as she sidestepped out from in front of him and stalked off down the corridor. She didn't look over her shoulder to see whether or not he followed her. She couldn't hear him walking, but she also didn't want to spend the night patrolling with him, so if he didn't follow he wouldn't complain.

"Why the library?" That wicked husky voice murmured from almost directly behind her and Hermione felt her shoulders go tense. How could he be walking right behind her without making a sound? It unnerved her to learn that if he wanted to he could stalk her with such stealth that she wouldn't know he was there if he didn't want her to. But Hermione didn't let on to him what she was thinking about any of that.

"Because the most frequented place this time of night is the library. Any stragglers who are still on their way back from the library ought to be hurried along." She told him without giving any reaction at all to the fact that he was right behind her. She didn't like having him at her back, but if she made a big deal about it, Malfoy would think she was afraid of him.

"The only person who ever stays at the library right up until Pince kicks everyone out is you Granger." Malfoy argued and Hermione fought not to let his husky voice get to her. It was different from the sneering, taunting tone he used in class. He still sounded slightly condescending whenever he spoke, but as he spoke to her where no one else would hear him, he dropped the act. Hermione pretend to shake out her hair as she walked to hide the way she shivered at the sound of his voice and at how unsettled she currently felt because of Draco Malfoy.

"Sometimes, but not always. Sometimes there are other students there late as well. Mostly they don't stay so late until N.E.W.T.s is closer. But we have to start somewhere." Hermione said as she descended the stairs towards the library.

"I thought we were supposed to do the top floors and all the towers while Goldstein and Abbott do the lower floors and the dungeons?" Malfoy said as he followed Hermione into the library. Madame Pince must have already turned in because she was nowhere in sight.

"We are supposed to, but since the majority of people returning this late are usually coming from the library we might as well start here. Besides, I already did the fourth floor and Anthony and Hannah will do the third." Hermione whispered. Malfoy snorted behind her at the fact that she was whispering just because they were in the library but he didn't argue anymore as he followed her through the library until she stopped directly in front of an odd looking bookshelf. It looked shabby in comparison to the rest of the library and Malfoy raised his eyebrows when Hermione began to run her finger lightly over the spines of the books on the top shelf.

"Granger we're on duty, not here for you to peruse the school textbooks." Malfoy snapped but Hermione pretended she didn't hear his irritated voice as she ran her finger lightly over the last book on the top shelf.

**Draco** snapped his mouth shut so Granger wouldn't see the way it had fallen open in surprise when the shabby little bookshelf swung forward away from the wall to reveal a narrow hidden staircase behind it. He watched in silence as Granger pulled out her wand. He never heard her speak but the tip flared to life providing enough light for the both to climb the incredibly narrow stairway. It was dusty and filled with cobwebs but even before Hermione stepped onto the first step Malfoy could see footprints in the thick layer of dust on the staircase. He paid especially close attention when they reached the top of the secret staircase and came out on what looked to be the fifth floor, from behind a picture of a sleeping wolfhound. It didn't wake as Hermione gently pushed the concealed door closed behind them.

She smirked out him before the light at the tip of her wand went out.

"It's a useful little passage if you know how to find it, but to get through it from this end you have to wake Sir Henry which is almost impossible." Hermione told him as she walked away from him again. Draco smirked when he realised that she was trying to prove to him that he wasn't the only one who could be sneaky and secretive.

The rest of the night they patrolled together in silence and Draco found that she wasn't nearly as annoying and insufferable when she was outside class and away from her dim-witted friends.

"Oh wow" he heard Hermione murmur softly as she pushed through the trapdoor and climbed out on top of the Astronomy Tower. When he climbed the ladder behind her and joined her on the roof Draco stared at the girl he hated so much. She leant against the banister of the viewing platform staring straight up at the glowing crescent moon and the bed of stars. Tonight there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the stars winked down at them brightly. Draco didn't know why he did it, but on silent feet he walked up right behind her, his arms going either side of her as he wrapped his hands around the metal railing outside of hers. He didn't touch her, even though he wanted to.

"A fan of star-gazing Granger?" He murmured directly into her ear, smirking at the innuendo. But Granger didn't seem to hear his crude tone. She didn't even react to having him right behind her, even though he had her trapped in the cage his arms made around her as she leant against the banister.

"I always have been" she told him, still staring up at the sky in awe "I've always wanted to know what's beyond this world, what's waiting out there in space beyond this galaxy." Draco was surprised to hear her admit something about herself to him, and even more surprised to learn that they had something in common.

"I love the way the constellations are arranged, the way they twinkle with that white light. I want to know why they look bright on nights when the moon glows as bright as a unicorn's hide. I want to know how many there are and how they interact with each other, what were they like before they died?" In that moment as Hermione Granger whispered to him on top of the Astronomy Tower, Draco Malfoy suddenly understood why she was so insufferable in class, why she read so many books and why she was so eager to answer any question a teacher threw at her. He'd always assumed she was just a goody-two-shoes, but he suddenly realised that it was because she believed that all the things she learned, her classmates should know about too. Not because she felt their educations were lacking, but because she was sharing the wonder she felt when she learned something.

"Do you know their names?" he murmured into her ear, surprising himself. He'd intended to sneer at her, but here he was asking her a question instead. Her hair brushed his face as she nodded because he stood so close to her.

"I learned them all when I was a little girl. My parents bought me my first telescope when I successfully arranged glow-in-the-dark stars on the roof of my bedroom in the shape of the constellations." Hermione told him and Draco stood there wondering what on earth glow-in-the-dark stickers were.

"Why didn't you just charm the ceiling so you stare at the real ones all night? Why put stickers on your roof?" he asked completely baffled. Hermione Granger laughed at his words, causing her back to brush against his chest as she giggled. "What's so funny?" he demanded when she kept staring up at the stars and giggling.

"Your ignorance is funny Malfoy. You constantly belittle me for the fact that I'm muggle-born, yet you understand nothing about what it means. Before I turned eleven and got my Hogwarts letter, I had to do things the muggle way. Muggles don't have access to magic to charm their ceilings to look like the night sky, so they make do with glowing stickers that absorb light from their technology and glow when all the lights go out." She told him. Draco raised his eyebrows though she couldn't see him do it before he looked back up at the stars above them and realised that Hermione Granger felt the same way he did when she saw them twinkle.

**Hermione** knew he was right behind her; knew that he'd trapped her against the railing and knew he was well within her personal space. He had been all night. Even when she'd led him up the secret staircase out of the library she had found at the end of last year, he'd been right behind her. Hermione was surprised that she'd already grown accustomed to it since they'd only been patrolling for two hours. The astronomy tower was the last stop before she would return to Gryffindor Tower, he to the dungeons. She didn't know why she was telling him about her love of the night's beauty or why she was telling him anything at all. They'd spent the last few hours in silence and she hadn't really minded. It had been like having a shadow with him walking right behind her, silent and stealthy.

But she couldn't stay silent when she'd seen the clear sky of the night and the uninhibited view of the stars. Hermione tried to ignore the part of her that wanted to lean back against the warmth she could feel emanating from him, refusing to do so because she just knew that if she did he would pull away from her in disgust. All night the sexual tension had hung between them, thick and heavy, making her want to provoke him into kissing her again. Yet by the same token the very idea of ever kissing him was abhorrent and wrong. He was cruel and unkind to others and especially to her. In second year he had even stated that he hoped the Basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets would kill her.

Hermione argued with herself about it, trying to squash down the part of her that was being drawn to him because of the way he'd made her feel last year. She refused to do anything to make him think she'd enjoyed it and last year she had worked hard to construct a wall of indifference towards him so that he wouldn't know how much his kiss had affected her. Because it had. She'd never been able to look at him without flashing back to that night, to the feel of his arms around her and his hard body pressing her into the wall, the sensations he'd spent spiralling through her that woke up something inside her that yearned to feel that way again. She knew she shouldn't want that from him, but a small part of her did, no matter how much she squashed it down.

"Cassiopeia looks beautiful tonight" Malfoy murmured in that husky voice that had been making Hermione think about his lips all evening, and Hermione realised that he might know about stars as much as she did. Taking her eyes off the twinkling sky Hermione looked sideways at him. His face hovered over her right shoulder but he had it tipped back as he stared up at the stars. Making sure not to brush against him, Hermione turned her head slightly to get a better view and she wondered if he heard the way her breath caught in her throat when she looked at him.

The moonlight caught his white blonde hair in such a way that he looked to have a halo around his head, and the stars he stared at twinkled in his grey eyes. For the first time Hermione realised that he didn't wear a smirk of sneer, or even the bored look she'd seen him wear him class over the years. As he stared up at the sky he smiled slightly and his grey eyes were wide with awe. Hermione felt something inside her jolt as she realised that he loved the stars as much as she did. She could see it written all over his face. There beneath the moonlight as she watched him, Hermione looked differently at Draco Malfoy. She'd always thought his angular facial features make him look cruel and like a ferret, but when he wore a real smile and awe glowed in his grey eyes, Hermione suddenly understood why some people called him handsome.

"The stars are more interesting than me, Granger" he murmured, still wearing his real smile and looking at her out of the corner of his eye. Heroine blushed when she realised she'd been caught and bit her lip as she looked down at her hands. Suddenly she realised how close his were to hers, if she moved them at all hers would brush against his on the railing and Hermione had to fight to keep from doing just that. She heard her own sharp intake of breath when she felt him move behind her. He stepped into her, closing the miniscule distance between them so that she was once against pressed against his chest and she felt his warm breath against her cheek and neck moments before she felt his lips nibbling on her earlobe.

Hermione stopped breathing as desire stabbed through her so forcefully that if she hadn't been already gripping the railing hard, she would've gripped his hands. Her body tensed up all over at the feel of his hot mouth on her skin, sending waves of yearning pulsing through her to the secretive place beneath her abdomen that made her feel hot and cold all over. Goose pimples took over her skin and Hermione bit her lip when Malfoy pressed kisses along her jaw and then down her neck. In spite of the promises she'd made to herself to do nothing to let him know how he made her feel, Hermione felt herself melt back against his hard chest, leaning into his warmth and a soft whimper escaped her when he stopped kissing her neck in favour of skimming his nose across her skin.

**Draco** couldn't stand the sexual tension a moment longer when he'd seen her bite her lip nervously at being caught watching him and he realised he'd been right about Forbidden Fruit; one taste hadn't been enough. The feel of her soft curves melting back against him sent a hot spear of longing through his body and he wondered if he would feel this way until his succulent, sweet smelling forbidden fruit was devoured. Slowly, making sure he wouldn't spook her, Draco took his hand away from the railing and pressed it gently against her soft stomach. In spite of the evening chill she wore only her white school shirt beneath her Gryffindor robes, and he longed to slide his hand beneath the single layer of fabric to find out if the skin of her stomach was as soft as the skin of her neck and her cleavage.

He knew if he moved too fast he'd frighten her and she'd run, though she showed absolutely no fear of him and he didn't want to spook her away before he got a second taste. The scent of her perfume filled his head, almost making him lose control of himself and he smiled at the rush that went through him as she moaned when he marked her pretty flesh again. He marvelled at the way she kept her hands clenched around the railing, as though she was afraid to let go. He wondered if she was purposely restraining them to keep from wandering his body like his currently wandered hers. When her head dropped back onto his shoulder again he took full advantage of her exposed throat, finding the sweet spots that made her moan and brought her undone enough that one of her hands seized hold of his that was still on the railing. Her nails dug into his skin when he marked her skin with another love bite, this one high on the front of her throat while the other one nestled beneath the collar of her shirt. He nipped her for the nails trying to break the skin on the back of his hand and she relaxed her grip, trailing her nails over his hand and his wrist now that it wasn't pinned. When she trailed her nails lightly up his forearm, Draco lifted that hand from the railing and brought it to the side of her head where it laid on his shoulder. Very gently he turned her face, giving her plenty of time to pull away from him before he brushed his lips ever so softly across hers.

Hermione sighed against him at the kiss and without breaking away from his lips she turned until she was facing him instead of awkwardly kissing him over her shoulder. Draco felt the beast in his chest that had been pacing inside it's cage all evening lie down and purr contentedly as she leant into the kiss. His hand found its way inside the back of her shirt and he trailed his fingertips over the soft skin of her lower back before pressing his palm against her, urging her closer as he slid his tongue into her mouth. She tasted like strawberries.

**Hermione** didn't know what it was that came over her then. Last time she had the excuse of not knowing who it was that made her feeling like this, but this time she knew it was Malfoy. She knew and still she turned eagerly and pressed herself into him, tongue and lips moving in harmony with his. She didn't understand how he made her feel so amazing. All she knew was that in that moment she didn't want to stop kissing him. His hand was warm against her lower back as he used it to bring her body flush against his, and the other was tangled in her hair at the nape of her neck, securing her face to his as he kissed her.

This kiss wasn't as tender as the last. It wasn't as timid or uncertain either. As she let Draco Malfoy kiss her on top of the Astronomy Hermione could feel his urgency in the way he kissed her, his hand kneading against her back and his tongue sweeping faster. Passion was like an addictive drug as she felt completely swept off her feet by the way he seemed to crave this kiss. Her heart was hammering against her ribcage inside her chest and Hermione met his urgency with her own intensity.

He'd been right earlier; often during the summer her mind had drifted to him and the way he'd made her feel when he kissed her. Hermione hadn't realised how much she'd been wanting to do it again until now; but now that she was, she stopped caring that he might know he was making her feel anything. She brought her hands up and tangled them into his silky blonde hair and threw all the passion and desire and longing she was feeling into their kiss. She was going to be sixteen in a few weeks and she knew what boys her age developed an interest in at this age. But right now Hermione didn't care. She didn't care about anything but the way Draco Malfoy was making her feel. Tongues swept together faster, lips pressed harder, hands urged for more and Hermione lost herself in the sweet minty taste of him.

**Draco** tightened his grip on Hermione when her hand shoved at his hips, pushing him back from her and breaking their kiss. Her hands had been travelling all over him from messing up his hair and cupping his cheeks to fisting in his shirt and finally gripping his hips. They were both panting and in the moonlight he could see that her lips were swollen and red, her eyes glittered reflecting the stars and showing him exactly how much their kissing was affecting her. The beast inside him growled when she pushed against his hips keeping him from diving back in to kiss her again as she tried to catch her breath.

He'd never felt more alive than he did right then, his heart racing and body singing with the need to devour her completely. He might only be fifteen but he wanted her in ways he'd never wanted anything. Her hair was a mess from where he'd run his hands through it and he liked the way her chest rose and fell rapidly as she tried to get back in control of herself and the situation. He really didn't want to let her, but she'd already stopped him once, and to try again and be stopped would make him look desperate.

Even though the beast inside his chest roared at the surrender, slowly Draco loosened his grip on her, his eyes searching her brown ones for any indication that it bothered her to have him let go. He smirked when he found one. Her fingers were hooked around his belt but as he loosened his grip she let go of him, dropping her hands to her sides. Draco narrowed his eyes at the infuriating little know-it-all when she looked away from him before completely turning around and looking back up at the sky. On silent feet he turned away and headed for the trap door. If she was just going to ignore him again and pretend their kiss that hadn't happened, he wasn't going to hang around and let her. She must have heard him even though he trod so softly because just as he reached the trapdoor he heard her husky voice.

"Malfoy…. Why?" she asked softly. He looked back at her to find her watching him with a look that was three parts confusion and one part irritation. As he stared at her messy hair, her swollen lips and those twinkling brown eyes, the beast inside his chest wanted to blurt out something ridiculous but he jumped on the thought before it could even form. He wasn't going to let a thought like that try and affect him, he wasn't going to let it enter his head. So as he stared at the girl he sometimes daydreamed about, Draco shrugged his shoulders and smirked at her.

"Forbidden fruit."


	3. Orchid

**Orchid**

Hermione was grateful all over again when she woke the next morning that Sirius had let her have an intricately carved old hand mirror that she'd found when they were cleaning up Grimmauld Place. She was even gladder that she kept it on her bedside table where she could reach it without having to leave the safety of the drawn curtain around her four poster bed. Because when she snatched it off the table and sat up in bed, Hermione groaned at the pair of love bites Malfoy had left on the right side of her throat. One of them wasn't so bad, it was just a small one right down near her collarbone, but the other one was high on her throat, right up near her jaw.

All night she'd been in a state of irritated confusion because of the stupid blonde haired git who kept kissing her. She'd tried to ask him why he kept doing it and the only answer he'd given her was that wicked smirk and two little words. _Forbidden Fruit_. Hermione had no idea what that meant. She'd studied scripture as a child before she found out she was a witch and she knew the story of Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit but she couldn't see how that related at all to Malfoy kissing her.

During the summer while she'd been with her parents, Hermione had bought herself a little pot of muggle make-up to replenish the one she had exhausted for the Yule Ball. Normally she never wore make-up, but today she was glad she had because she used it to cover the purple love bites on her neck before covering them both with a Concealment charm, making sure that if the charm wore off no one would notice the marks before she had time to renew the charm. She could just imagine how Ron or Harry or Ginny would react if they saw a love bite on her neck.

Ron would probably think she had pimples since he was a bit dense like that sometimes, Harry would probably wonder but perhaps not say anything. Then again given how angry he'd been lately he might explode at her again, and Ginny… Ginny would grill her for details about who she had been spending such time with that she was intimate with them to the point where she had not one, but two love bites. And Hermione couldn't tell her it was Malfoy or her friends would probably murder her, but she also couldn't lie about it and say it was someone else when it clearly wasn't.

The safest option was to hide it from them and never ever speak of the incidents to anyone. She had no idea why he kept kissing her and she really had no idea why she kept letting him, but it simply wouldn't do to have anyone find out about it. When the marks were safely hidden Hermione got out of bed and got dressed, trying aimlessly to tame her hair. It was a pointless venture since she had gone to bed with it wet, falling into bed as she tried to stop blushing after her shower. Decided that it was completely pointless Hermione pulled it up into a high ponytail. It was counterproductive for covering the love bites on her neck, but magic and make-up would have to hide those if she didn't want to walk around looking like a lion who stuck his claw in a power outlet all day.

When she was dressed and ready she filled her bag with her books and headed off for the Great Hall so she could do her study at the table while she ate her breakfast. She needed something to distract her from the thoughts of last night, as well as from the fact that she'd had to charm her toothpaste to taste like strawberries rather than mint since the smell of mint now made her think of Draco Malfoy.

She was half way through her breakfast when Harry and Ron plopped down next to her at Gryffindor table and began piling their plates.

"How did last night go with Malfoy?" Harry asked her.

"Yeah, he didn't say anything or try to do anything to you did he?" Ron asked around a mouthful of sausage. Hermione wrinkled her nose in disgust when she caught sight of the chewed up food in his open mouth.

"He told me he was looking forward to torment me for eight hours a week for the entire term" she replied "But other than that it went fine."

"He didn't try to make you patrol the dungeons with him did he?" Ron asked.

"Actually Dumbledore gave the Head boy and girl specific instructions that I specifically was not under any circumstances allowed to patrol the dungeons for the entire time while I'm a Prefect." Hermione told her friends.

"He must think it's not safe for you either." Harry said.

"He's right. Especially if you're there with Malfoy. They'd attack you in a heartbeat for being muggle-born" Ron said, sounding pleased at Dumbledore's forethought even as he glared darkly at the Slytherin table.

"I can't believe you got stuck with Malfoy right off the bat" Harry said "Ron showed me his roster and he has to patrol with Padma Patil this term."

"Because that won't be awkward or anything" Ron muttered.

"If you hadn't been such a snot to her at the Yule Ball last year it wouldn't be awkward for you at all." Hermione chastised him, even as she saw Harry go still in expectation of the coming argument.

"I wasn't a snot to her. Just because I don't like dancing does not mean I treated her badly." Ron argued hotly.

"Well maybe if you'd made a better attempt at even acknowledging her existence, she wouldn't glare at you every time she sees you. The ball was about making friends as I have pointed out several times. You did a poor job of that when you refused to even look at your date all because you had your wand in a knot over nothing." Hermione snapped at him, welcoming the argument for the distraction from the fact that Malfoy had just walked into the hall.

"I did acknowledge her existence! I sat with her at dinner didn't I?"

"And attacked your food with a lack of manner that Mrs Weasley would have punished you for if she'd seen you. You behaved like a child the entire evening. You ruined her night, you tried to ruin mine and you probably ruined Harry's all because you got jealous of the fact that Viktor asked me to be his date when he barely acknowledged your existence even when you asked for his autograph." Hermione saw harry cringe as Hermione dragged him into their argument.

"Harry did I ruin your night at the Yule ball?" Ron demanded, cutting his bacon with excessive force.

"No." Harry said, flashing Hermione an apologetic smile because he knew Ron would use it against her in their argument.

"See Hermione! If you hadn't been fraternising with the enemy everything would have been fine!" Ron snarled at her triumphantly. Hermione glared at him witheringly. Sometimes she really couldn't stand how immature Ronald Weasley was, but even as she had that thought something occurred to her. Viktor had kissed her hand to bid her goodnight that night, and she'd been jumped by Malfoy on the way to bed. She'd even kissed him like she had last night. Could it be that Ron's real reason for being so angry with her that night was because she'd gone with someone who wasn't him? They fought often, but they were friends and he had asked her in a roundabout way as a last resort. There had never been anything romantic between them, but maybe Ron subconsciously thought of her as his. She knew Harry though of her like a sister, but Ron had a sister he didn't fight with nearly as much.

Letting her temper get the better of her, Hermione shoved the book she'd been reading back into her school bag and slung it over her shoulder, leaping to her feet.

"Ronald, just because you finally realised I was a girl and actually pretty enough for you to fancy, does not give you the right to behave like a two year old who didn't get to pay with his favourite toy! Grow up!" Hermione snapped at the boy, whirling away from the table and storming out of the hall, but not before her eyes met a pair of grey ones across the Great Hall and found them watching her in amusement.

* * *

**Draco** watched Granger leap to her feet with anger written all over her face. She'd been avoiding looking at him since he walked in and he found it amusing that she was arguing with the Weasel again. He had no idea what she snapped at the ginger before accidently meeting his gaze and then storming away but it must have been something good based on the way she stalked out of the hall like a model on a catwalk. Her hips swung and her tied up hair bounced while the pair of dolts she left behind her stared after her in shock.

When he got to class Draco snorted to see her already there, sitting close to the front where her friends weren't likely to join her. She was bent over her desk, her quill scribbling furiously before he watched her haul a textbook that had nothing to do with charms out of her bag and slam it down on the desk where she flipped through it to check some fact she was using in whatever homework she was doing. He was surprised as class started to see that she wasn't paying proper attention to Flitwick, only answering a question if the teacher called on her when no one else answered. She seemed distracted and he couldn't help the wicked smirk the curled across his face. He had a vague idea what might be distracting her from her studies.

In Transfiguration she sat up the front again, and then again in Defence Against the Dark Arts. It wasn't until the afternoon when he walked into Arithmancy that he got a good look at her from front on. Her knew he'd left two love bites on her neck during their little encounter last night, but when Professor Vector order him to move seats and work with Granger, he finally caught sight of her neck. He couldn't see a mark on it and for a moment he wondered if she had healed the little bruises he'd left on her but when he look closer he noticed the slightly different shades of her skin where the marks should be, as well as the glimmer of magic.

As he stared at it, the effect of the charm broke, because he knew what he was looking for and how to get around the magic. He still couldn't see the marks properly because of the make-up she had over them, but he was pleased she'd thought to ensure no one would see them no matter what. He wasn't ashamed of leaving them there, there was a sick little part of him that liked leaving marks on her skin, even though such marks were a sign of possession and ownership. But he also didn't want anyone but her to know they were there in case it somehow got out that he'd been kissing a mudblood.

Draco jumped in surprise when a foot stomped down on his beneath the table and he glared at her as he realised she'd done it. She glared right back at him before pointedly staring at the paper he wasn't doing because he was too busy staring at the love bites he'd left on her neck. Catching her silent meaning he looked away and hurried to catch up to where she was up to with their arithmancy equations. It was as he was finishing up the paper that he realised she hadn't blushed when she'd met his gaze today and he started to chuckle very softly.

Hermione glared at him, keeping her head down so she wouldn't draw attention to them. Draco chuckled some more when she raised her eyebrows, silently asking what his problem was. He smirked at her before brushing his hand casually against the side of his own neck, making sure to drag his fingers over the spots where he'd marked her. Hermione narrowed her eyes at him before she glanced towards Professor Vector who was helping another student. He watched her, intrigued, as she pulled her wand out of her pocket and tapped them to the exact spots on her throat where the love bites where, silently mouthing the charm. When she pocketed her wand again the marks were once again invisible and Draco jumped when she kicked him in the shins under the table because he couldn't stop chuckling about it.

He narrowed his eyes back at her, certain no one would see him as kissed the air while holding her gaze before bouncing his eyebrows suggestively. This time she blushed, but even as she did so, Granger scowled and then very childishly stuck her tongue out at him. Draco raised his eyebrows in shock. No one had stuck their tongue out at him like that since he was five years old and it had been Pansy who'd done it. To see Granger do it ten years later completely stumped him.

When they left the classroom at the end of the lesson, Draco felt the inexplicable urge to drag her into the broom cupboard around the corner so he could kiss her some more. He couldn't because his friends were there, waiting to go to lunch but as he glanced back at the desk where they'd sat he noticed something sitting on the desk they had shared and he walked back inside to pick it up. It was book, only it wasn't a textbook. It was a small paperback novel with an unmoving picture of a man and a woman on the cover. Draco raised his eyebrows at the image. The people were scantily clad, the man wearing no shirt, the woman in suggestive silk bedclothes.

Draco stood there baffled for a minute expecting them to move but they didn't so he turned the book over to read the inscription on the back. When he did his eyebrows nearly disappeared into his hairline. What was Granger doing reading the type of book that had such suggestive writing on the back?

"Draco, are you coming?" Pansy Parkinson's whiny voice called from the doorway impatiently and Draco shoved the novel into his school bag, thinking he might just have to do a little research into exactly what kind of book this was that Granger was reading in class.

* * *

**Hermione** groaned when she searched through all of her belongings and still didn't find the trashy muggle book she'd been reading in an attempt to distract herself from memories of last night. She didn't know why, but reading about the sexual escapades of others helped her to forget about her own for a little while. She had a small stash of them, though she'd read all the others except the one she had taken with her to class today. The only place she could think of that she might have left it was in Arithmancy after Professor Vector had made her work with Malfoy. He'd antagonised her and sitting so close to him when he smelled so good had been driving her insane. When she'd finished her work she'd pulled out the book and bent the front cover around so no one could see what it was. She must have left it on the desk when she packed up her bag, but she'd gone back there earlier and hadn't managed to find it.

Of course, reading a hot love scene while sitting next to Draco Malfoy hadn't exactly distracted her in the way she had expected. Instead of forgetting about the way he made her feel and focusing on the feelings of the character in the novel like she usually did, she'd found herself imagining doing the things that characters had been doing, only she'd imagined herself doing them with Malfoy. It made sitting next to him incredibly awkward while she was reading and imagining such things, but now that she was away from him she kind of wanted to pick back up where she'd left off and see what her imagination could come up with now that she didn't have to worry about him catching her blushing. She was especially anxious because of what he'd done today. Right there in class where anyone could see he'd made mention of the love bites he'd given her and then he'd blown a kiss at her! Was he barmy?

No one was ever going to know about the two of them having kissed! No one! And if he kept up that sort of behaviour he was going to give them away.

The next day Snape made her work with Malfoy in Potions and Hermione couldn't stand it. Almost every potions lesson this term was double potions because the Potions he had them learning were incredibly fiddly and complex and took more than an hour to complete. Today's potion called for a lot of simultaneous stirring adding and concocting. Snape had apparently paired up the class based on ability and since Malfoy was second in the class, he and Hermione had to work together.

"If you mess this up in any way I'll hex you into next week Malfoy" Hermione threatened him darkly when he made a big show of insulting her and complaining about having to work with her. Even in Snape's class he didn't go so far as to call her a mudblood though she could tell it had been on the tip of his tongue. She'd long since stopped caring about any insult he threw at her, though she did blush when he stood quite close to her apparently under the pretence of threatening her. His grey eyes smouldered down at her and the smirk he flashed was full of mischief.

"And if you mess it up I'll make sure even Madame Pomfrey can't fix what I do to you." He told her. He said it quite loud and his tone was menacing, but from where he stood, well within her personal space as he looked down his nose at her, Hermione could swear there was a carnal promise in his eyes that Madame Pomfrey wouldn't be able to fix the things he'd do to her because they wouldn't be physical injuries. Though Hermione suspected that whatever he had in mine would indeed be incredibly physical. When she blushed bright pink he smirked wickedly.

They set about brewing the potion in silence, Hermione cutting up Valerian root and dropping it into the potion two cubes at a time while Malfoy stirred the Potion six times clockwise and then twice counter-clockwise in a continuous rhythm. He kept on stirring when she came back over to put nine drops of dittany in and Hermione had to reach out and catch his hand to stop him from stirring it the wrong way as she let the final drop fall into the potion. He was too busy staring at the bottle in her hand and Hermione jumped at the zap of electricity that shot up her arm when she touched him. He smirked at her while he stirred the potion the other way and Hermione searched his face for some explanation for that jolt but if he felt it he didn't let on. Instead he winked at her when no one was looking and Hermione blushed all over again.

Snape came past while Hermione was still blushing and she noticed the glare he threw at her and then at Malfoy after he looked down his nose at their potion and found nothing to criticise. He nodded almost imperceptibly at Malfoy before he moved away again. Hermione bit her lip when Malfoy's eyes met hers through the pink mist emanating from their potion.

The class was almost over when it happened. They were packing away ingredients and Malfoy followed her into the supply closet. He didn't say a word as he put away the jars a phials of ingredient beside her but when Hermione let her empty hands drop to her side as she went to leave the closet, she felt Malfoy's hand wrap around hers, his palm pressing flat against hers. It was only for a moment, and when he pulled away he didn't even look at her before he left to supply closet. But he'd left something in her hand.

Hermione looked down to see a rolled up strip of torn off parchment. Glancing around, she unfurled it and read the neat, elegantly written words.

_**If you keep biting your bottom lip like that Granger, I'm going to bite it for you.**_

He hadn't signed it, hadn't given any indication that he'd even written it, but obviously he had otherwise why would he give it to her? Hermione couldn't believe her eyes. What was he playing at, passing her notes in class like this? Especially such a suggestive one. In spite of her shock at his daring, Hermione couldn't keep the little smirk off her face at the idea that she was subconsciously doing something to provoke him. Rolling the note back up, Hermione slipped it into the pocket of her school shirt and buttoned the flap closed so it wouldn't fall out.

When she went back out into the classroom, Hermione was still smirking. She and Malfoy had been the first to finish their potion, but they weren't finished cleaning up yet. Hermione joined him at their work bench and after a moment he glanced sideways at her, one eyebrows tweaked just a little bit higher than the other, clearly asking her whether or not she'd read the note he'd given her. Hermione's smirk widened before she pretended to turn towards him to reach for something. As she did she let her eyes slide up to meet his defiantly before she very deliberately worried the left side of her bottom lip with her front teeth, biting down on the plump flesh gently and tugging it between her teeth before sensually letting it slide back out of her grasp.

Hermione almost giggled when his eyes flashed hungrily. It was payback for him blowing that kiss at her yesterday and she actually did laugh just a little bit when she saw his fist clench, his arm twitching towards her a little bit. After his little performance yesterday Hermione had made sure to add an extra spray of her perfume to her skin, dabbing some of the sweet smelling liquid behind both of her ears, on the inside of her wrists and elbows as well as swiping a trail of the liquid down her cleavage. They were all areas that stayed warm and so reacted with the liquid on her skin, intensifying the scent. Normally she only rubbed it on her wrists and the sides of her neck, but today she had added a little extra in the hopes of provoking him.

* * *

**Draco** couldn't believe his eyes when Granger walked out of the cupboard after reading the note he'd given her and then so deliberately bit her bottom lip. She'd been driving him crazy doing it all day, and working with her for two hours was testing his control. She smelled completely intoxicating and he'd spent last night reading the erotic little novel she'd dropped. He hadn't been able to look at her the same way after he'd finished it. It was first and foremost a cheap love story, but it was also filled with some incredibly erotic sex scenes that had him straining in his boxers. And the wicked little minx had been reading it in class!

The idea that she read such novels at all had him looking at her differently, but to know she'd been sitting there next to him in Arithmancy reading such things…. It turned him on! He didn't particularly like to admit it, but over the last few days he'd learned a whole slew of new things about the bookworm he had always assumed to be rule-loving and prudish. If he hadn't experienced first -hand the way she reacted to his touch, he would have even thought her to be frigid. But knowing she read that kind of book in a classroom… it really made him want to push everything else off their work bench and throw her down on it right there in the middle of class. After all, reading such things in class was almost the same thing. All night as he'd read the book she'd dropped, he'd pictured himself doing those things to her and there was a part of him that had his father's voice that lectured him about all the reasons such thoughts about a mudblood were unacceptable. But as he stared at her in potions with her hair tied up in an incredibly messy ponytail, with make-up on her neck to hide the love bites he'd given her and her lips looking so soft and inviting he found that voice easy to ignore.

She went right on packing her things away and cleaning up while he fought to keep from grabbing her and pushing her against the nearest flat surface. Suddenly Draco Malfoy realised that he had a thing for the sexy little mudblood. Horrified with himself and the idea of what would happen to him if anyone ever found out such a thing, Draco clenched his fists again. He wanted to convince himself that he was wrong, but as she leaned over the desk to reach for something of hers that was on his side of the bench her forearm brushed against his and he felt a zap of electricity ping through his body from the slight contact. Her perfume was thick in the air she stirred towards him and he found his nostrils flaring to catch the scent. There was no denying it, he Draco Malfoy, was intrigued by Hermione Granger. He bloody well had a thing for her and though he knew that he didn't suddenly fancy her, he did know he wanted to spend a whole lot more time with her; preferably time spent pushing her up against walls and having his way with her.

The irresponsible beast inside his chest that had gotten him into this mess roared when she moved away from him and Draco realised that his forbidden fruit theory was correct. He wasn't going to be able to get her off his mind until he'd had her. Until he'd tasted all of her and learned just how sweet and succulent she really was. After reading that book of hers he suspected that might turn out to be a whole lot more than he'd originally suspected. Trying to distract himself he went back to cleaning everything up, though unlike her, he flicked his wand cleaning everything and watching all of his potion making equipment fold themselves neatly into their kit and then into his bag.

It didn't help. Granger sat there on her stool and pulled a little pot of some sweet smelling stuff out of the pocket of her robes and proceeded to smear it onto her lips, making them look and smell even more inviting than they had a moment ago. Merlin he wanted her! As he watched her rub her soft lips together he suddenly found himself silently cursing his entire upbringing, his father and everything in his life that dictated he couldn't just pull her sideways off her stool and ravish her mouth right now in front of everyone.

He might have been raised to believe that her muggle parents made her inferior, but he couldn't deny she was the brightest witch of her age and she was turning out to be prettier than anyone had ever expected she could be. From what he's seen of her over the years she was brave and clever and tough enough that she'd even punched him in the nose in third year. For someone who was supposed to be inferior and dirty and according to his father: didn't deserve to live, Draco couldn't help thinking that she was everything his father expected of a pureblood witch. She might not hold her tongue like pureblood women were taught to, but Draco kind of like the way her eyes glittered with fury when she argued about something.

If being a mudblood made her so inferior and meant she shouldn't be allowed to use magic, why in Merlin's trousers was she the best in every class at using it?

* * *

**Hermione **waited for Malfoy in the same spot she had waited for him two nights ago. She'd kind of enjoyed her day now that she had something she knew would provoke him and she caught his eye at dinner before smirking as she bit her bottom lip again. Perched on the windowsill she was reading one of the trashy muggle novels she had already read since she had apparently been careless and misplaced her other one. She still hadn't managed to find it, so she resorted to re-reading one of her favourite ones.

It was about a police officer and a librarian who fell in love after they caught sight of each other when he'd been investigating a murder that happened in her library. It had some particularly raunchy sex scenes in it, most of them occurring in the library. After she'd read it for the first time in the summer holidays Hermione had developed a minor fantasy of being kissed in the library, somewhere dark and private in one of the sections no one ever visited. Of course as she read this book her fantasies didn't stop at just being kissed in a library but every time she even tried to picture herself having sex at all, let alone in a library, she couldn't stop giggling like an idiot.

Hermione was in the middle of a particular vivid scene where the policemen got hit on the head as books fell off the shelves the librarian was leaning against as he had his way with her, when someone plucked the book from her hands. Squeaking in protest not only at being interrupted, but also at being caught reading a sexy adult novel, Hermione leapt off the windowsill and caught hold of the thief's wrist before he could see what she was reading.

The stormy grey eyes of Draco Malfoy smouldered down at her when Hermione glared up at the thief of her book. She stopped struggling to get the book back when she realised how close she was standing to him as he held it over her head. Another inch and her breasts would brush against his chest intimately. Since they were already tingling from the intense scene within her book, Hermione didn't think that would be a good idea.

Knowing he was going to torment her Hermione let go of him, dropping her hands to her sides and she bit down on her bottom lip without thinking as she looked at her feet, trying to hide her embarrassment and to keep from watching his expression as he realised what she was reading.

"Another one?" He asked, astonished "Granger, how many of these erotic books do you own?" Malfoy exclaimed.

Hermione's head snapped up "What?" she asked, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. He was smirking at her wickedly, and Hermione recognised the heat in his gaze, not as heat of hatred, but as heat that stemmed from lust.

He didn't answer her question, choosing instead to reach into his pocket and pull out the book she had lost yesterday. Hermione felt her cheeks start to burn in mortification.

"You had it? I've been looking for this all day!" she snapped snatching it from him as though the action might make him forget what he'd learned.

"Quite the… engaging… novel you're into, there Granger." He tormented her.

"You read it?" Hermione gasped, finding that she hadn't been nearly as embarrassed as she thought she was when her cheeks literally burned. Draco Malfoy not only knew she read trashy muggle smut, but he'd actually read one of the ones she'd been reading! Hermione thought she might just die of embarrassment. She'd been imaging doing things from her book with Malfoy, and there he was smirking down at her, his eyes telling her that he'd actually had read her smut filled paperback. Hermione buried her face in her hands, mortified.

"Tell me Granger" that evilly seductive husky voice murmured down at her from right in front of her "Does anyone else know what kinds of depravity you immerse yourself in?" Hermione could hear the gleefulness in his voice and it made her blush even more.

"I can't believe you read it!" She breathed through her hands, staring down at his shiny black shoes through her fingers without lifting her head.

"I can't believe you sat there reading such things right next to me in a classroom." He countered softly "I was blushing in bed with my curtains drawn, and you sat next to me without any indication that you were reading about a powerful business man pressing his secretary down onto a lounge and fertilising her lady garden."

Hermione pursed her lips and tried to ignore the traitorous thrill that raced through her at hearing Draco Malfoy's husky voice talking dirty to her. She had no idea where the courage or even the thought came from but Hermione suddenly found herself looking up into his wild grey eyes and saying:

"Well, if you'd prefer you can read that one, it's about a policeman tasting the sweet flavour of his librarian's nether peach." Hermione murmured right back to him "I know how much you enjoy fruit."

She couldn't help but smile mischievously when his eyes widened slightly to hear her say such things.

"Just how many of these books do you own Hermione?" he whispered to her, eyes boring into hers as though he could learn all of her secrets by staring into her eyes. Hermione let them twinkle secretively as she looked back at him and not knowing where her own daring came from, stepped closer to him so that her breasts brushed lightly against his chest. He'd used her real name and after hearing him say such sexual things, combined with having been picturing doing some of them with him, kind of made Hermione want to kiss him again right there in the corridor.

"Is that important?" She murmured huskily, pocketing the book he'd read and reaching slowly for the other one. She tried to tug it out of his grasp but he held it firmly and grinned evilly down into her upturned face.

"Yes, I want to know how many I'm borrowing from you." He said, his minty fresh breath caressing her face. Hermione raised her eyebrows in surprise.

"You want to borrow them?"

"I am borrowing them Granger." He smiled genuinely and Hermione felt her insides react approvingly.

"Why on earth would you want to read my trashy muggle novels?" Hermione asked, completely baffled by him.

Suddenly hearing footsteps Hermione quickly steeped back from him and began to walk away down the hallway. She knew Malfoy was following her, though this time he stayed further away from her.

"You two! What are you doing out of bed?" the voice of Mr Filch wheezed at them from the end of the corridor where they had been standing a few minutes ago.

"We're patrolling Mr. Filch" Hermione said sweetly, turning to face the grizzled old man "We're the prefects on duty tonight."

* * *

**Draco** watched Filch leer at them for a minute while he narrowed his eyes at the stupid Squib, before the old bastard shuffled away again. When he turned back around her found Granger watching him. He couldn't believe she had said the thing about the peach, or that he'd caught her reading another smut filled novel. He couldn't believe she hadn't even tried to deny that she read them. But most of all he couldn't believe how much it turned him on to hear her mouth caressing the words "taste, sweet and nether peach" there was nothing crude about the actual words, but the image it put in his mind somehow involved her naked in his bed at the manor while he buried his face between her legs and kissed _Her_ nether peach the way he'd kissed her mouth.

Granger was still watching him and as he focused on her face in the firelight he just about came. She had secrets sparkling in her eyes, a mischievous smirk on her face and she was sensually biting down on her lip as she held his gaze. She'd done the same thing when she caught his eyes at dinner in the Great Hall and he'd instantly regretted giving her that note in class. All afternoon she'd been secretly meeting his eye and letting her teeth caress her lip like he wanted to caress them. It was driving him wild and he didn't know how much more he could take. Especially when she was doing it after voluntarily brushing herself up against him and peering up at him through her thick lashes.

She looked the picture of innocence and every second he spent in her company he was learning just how far from innocent she was. Draco watched the way she let herself check him out, eyes sliding over his body from head to toe and back again. He kind of liked the way she let her eyes linger on his lips for a minute before she turned away from him and walked off down the corridor.

An hour later he felt like he was going crazy. He still had hold of the book he'd snatched from her hands, fully intending to find out what kind of depravity she had been reading about while she waited for him. His nose was filled with the intoxicating scent of her perfume and he felt like he couldn't get it out of his head. He'd tried asking her again how many of the books she owned, but she'd just smirked at him wickedly and not answered. He was dying to grab her and push her against the wall as they rounded the corner, but he knew he couldn't.

The thrill of suspense was the only thing that kept him from it, the suspense of having her not know when he might spring into action. Draco didn't know exactly what it was about Hermione Granger, but after he had realised today in Potions that he seemed to have developed a thing for her, he'd been trying to pinpoint exactly what it was about her that seemed so intoxicating. He knew that a big part of her draw was that she was everything he wasn't allowed to want.

If there was one thing he struggled with, it was having someone tell him he couldn't do something or couldn't have something. As a child it had resulted with him eating so many sweets that he had a stomach ache for days, and it seemed that now it would result in him slavering after Hermione Granger, burning for another taste of her wickedly sweet mouth. Combining that sense of danger at being caught or found out was the delicious scent of her. He wanted to roll in the scent of her skin until he forgot everything his father had eve taught him about why kissing her was wrong, until he forgot everything nasty they'd ever done to each other and only the passion remained.

"Please don't walk on my heels" her soft voice hummed back to him in amusement and he realised that he'd been so lost in thoughts of her that he hadn't noticed how closely he followed her. He opened his mouth to reply but just before he could she stopped so suddenly that he ran into her.

"What did you do that for?" he hissed, his arms shooting around her middle automatically to catch her when she stumbled forward from the impact. But Grnager wasn;t listening.

"Do you hear that?" she hissed back at him, not even bothering to step out of his embrace. Draco stopped breathing to listen. He could hear something.

"Sounds like Moaning Myrtle." He replied.

"She usually doesn't leave to second floor bathroom where she died." Hermione shook her head at him.

"Maybe she got bored with moping about it."

"It's not Myrtle." Hermione told him, easily pulling out of his hold as she strode off quickly in the direction of the awful sounds. The beast in his chest didn't like letting her get away and Draco found himself walking faster to catch up with her.

"Merlin that's an awful sound" Draco complained in disgust as the awful wailing yelling sound. Hermione nodded in agreement as she led the way through the halls towards the sound. She actually walked right by the door the sound was emanating from before she whirled around and walked right back.

"What do you think it is?" Draco asked her nervously. Hermione glanced at him for a minute before she narrowed her eyes on the cupboard.

"Oh I have an idea of what it is. You might want to move out of the way while I open the door." She told him and Draco raised his eyebrows. She reached for the door handle before glancing at him again.

"If you stand there you'll be attacked." She told him seriously. Draco eyed her suspiciously. They were on the sixth floor. What could possibly be in this broom cupboard that made such an awful noise and would attack if they let it out?

"Where won't I be attacked?" he asked her. Granger smirked at that.

"You'll probably be out of harm's way if you take up your new favourite standing place again." Her eyes laughed at him and he raised his eyebrows. Whatever was in the cupboard yowled even louder and now sounded angry. "Malfoy, don't just stand there. Get behind me unless you want to turn into a scratching post."

"What's in there?" he asked her as he followed her instructions even though they grated against his nerves.

"I'll show you." Hermione said before she snatched the door open and the yowling, angry creature exploded into the hallways. It's red eyes narrowed on them before it streaked off still yowling.

"What the bloody hell was that?" Draco demanded, still not knowing what it was.

"Mrs Norris." Hermione told him, grinning over his shoulder.

"The Squib's disgusting cat?"

"He can't help being a Squib, Malfoy. Not all of us were born to rich, magical parents. Just because you were doesn't make you better than people who weren't." She snapped angrily, eyes flashing. "And just because some people are more privileged than others does not make them better people. You're entire house are proof of that." she growled at him, spinning to glare up at him.

Draco smirked at the attack, letting his lip curl just a little. How dare she talk to him like that? Granger glared at him when she saw his expression and Draco jumped when her little mudblood fist collided with his chest. It didn't hurt, but Draco stared at in shock. What was her problem? Two seconds ago she'd been fine and now she was raging mad at him, eyes snapping that familiar fire that had begun to turn him on.

"Touchy subject, eh Granger?" he sneered at her. Her fiery brown eyes narrowed on him.

"Don't smirk at me like that Malfoy. As far as I'm concerned you're a good for nothing little coward who hides behind his family's dark reputation. You don't scare me and if I ever here you use the words Squib or Mudblood around me again I'll make you regret it." She snapped at him coldly.

Draco raised his eyebrows.

"Who do you think you are Granger?" he snapped right back at her "You do not ever tell me what to do and if I ever hear you threaten me again…."

"No you only do what daddy tells you to do. You say what your father tells you to say and you think what he tells you to think. You're a coward and you're pathetic and yet you strut around the castle as though you're better than everyone just because Daddy has enough money to get you anything you want." The filthy little mudblood spat at him angrily before moving to turn away from him.

Draco narrowed his eyes on the bushy haired little witch. Before she could slam the door of the broom cupboard closed Draco grabbed her, wrapping his arms around her and shoving her bodily into the cupboard before stalking in after her, grinning in satisfaction as she tripped on a mop bucket. She whirled so fast that if he' been standing an inch closer her long busy hair would have whipped him across the face and Draco froze when she pressed her back against the wall of the cramped cupboard and her wand tip against his throat.

Narrowing his eye to slits as he glared his hatred at her Draco pulled the door of the cupboard shut with a snap before planting his hands on the wall either side of her face.

"What is your problem?" he demanded angrily as she poked her wand against his throat a little harder.

"You think you're better than everyone and you're not." She said coldly. Inside the cupboard now that the door was shut, he couldn't see a thing. He welcomed the darkness. Even as he stood there with her wand against his throat, all Draco could suddenly think of was the fact that they were alone in the dark and he already had her pressed against the wall.

"Hermione…" he murmured, his voice husky as he forgot his anger and lust rushed in to take its place.

"Don't Malfoy." She ground out when she heard his tone. He chuckled wickedly.

"What's really got your wand in a knot?" he murmured to her in the same voice, letting her hear his hunger for her. He kept his hands on the wall knowing that if he moved them he'd probably do something barmy like rip her shirt open. He'd been going crazy with lust for her for the past two days and now that he had her right where he wanted her it was all he could do not to jump her again.

"I hate you!" she hissed at him angrily through the darkness.

"Hasn't stopped you kissing me." He tormented her. He stepped closer to her, still not quite touching her, but letting her feel his body heat radiate towards her in the cramped cupboard.

"You keep kissing me, Malfoy not the other way around." She hissed indignantly.

"I gave you the chance to pull away or say no. It's not my fault you didn't take them."

"Lumos." She whispered, lowering her wand a little so it was in line with his chest instead of his throat "Why? Why do you keep doing it? Why did you ever do it?" she demanded searching his eyes and face for some hint of an answer.

Draco smiled at the confusion and anger on her features as he stared down at her form so close.

"I already told you that Granger."

"You said Forbidden Fruit. What does that mean? I took scripture but somehow I don't think you want to teach me tales about a muggle deity."

"You weren't listening Granger. The reason isn't forbidden fruit. You're the Forbidden Fruit."

* * *

**Hermione's** breath caught suddenly as the words he was saying clicked into place and she suddenly understood what he meant.

"Hadn't realised I was so tempting for you." She snapped, glaring up into his eyes.

"Now you know." He murmured back to her and Hermione felt her eyebrows lift in surprise to hear him actually admit it.

"What exactly are you saying Malfoy?"

"Do you have to overanalyse everything?" his eyes flashed at her irritably. Hermione looked away from him and bit her lip without thinking before remembering the note he'd given her. Her eyes shot back to his face and found his staring at her lips with such raw, undiluted lust that Hermione gasped. His eyes flicked to hers for a moment and Hermione could see the silent question in them. They all but begged her to let him kiss her.

Little thrills of nervousness and excitement raced through Hermione. She had no idea what she was doing here or why she'd let him push her into the broom cupboard. All she knew is that she wasn't supposed to want to kiss Draco Malfoy. She wasn't supposed to want to do any of the things she'd been thinking about doing with him all day. She wasn't supposed to smile at her reflection in the bathroom when she'd washed the make-up off the love bites he'd left on her, or smile secretively when she thought about how it felt to kiss him.

She was surprised to see the way his face asked her permission to kiss her now. And she was surprised by how much she wanted to.

"Malfoy…" Hermione breathed, feeling tingling sensations tickle their way through her body, making her want to do the things with him that she'd been reading about and Hermione felt herself blush at the thrill that raced through her at the idea of doing anything more than kiss him like she already had. She bit her lip on her smile before she let the light at her wand tip fizzle out. Just before it didn't she caught sight of the unadulterated hunger on his face and then he was kissing her.

Hermione gasped as Draco Malfoy kissed her hard, pressing his hard body against hers. She felt his knee slide up between her thighs, spreading them apart a little before he leaned forwards until his pelvis aligned with hers. Something inside her rushed with longing when she felt the hardness of him pressing intimately against her nether region and Hermione dropped her wand arm from between them, sliding her wand into her pocket before bringing both up to grip his ribs and pull him even closer.

The feel of his lips on hers and his hard body grinding against her made Hermione wanted to wrap her legs around him and do unspeakable things with him right there in that cramped broom cupboard. She hissed when he very gently thrust against her and Malfoy gently took her bottom lip between his teeth. Hermione wrapped her ankle around his calf muscles and smiled as she let her hands slide up his back beneath his shirt. His skin was warm and inviting and he gave another gentle thrust when she trailed her long nails over his skin.

His tongue dove into her mouth and tangled with hers and Hermione felt like she couldn't get enough of him. She whimpered when he leant away from her for a moment without breaking their kiss and Hermione's eyes flew open in surprise when she realised he'd take his hands off the wall. Because he'd just taken hold of the two side of her white school shirt and tugged, sending the buttons pinging off to hit the walls and the floor as he ripped her shirt open. He didn't stop kissing her or even open his eyes as her did it and Hermione let hers slide closed as she melted at the feel of his warm hands brushing against her stomach and around her back.

I shouldn't be doing this, Hermione thought to herself as Draco Malfoy pulled away from lips to kiss his way down her neck, burying his lips against her throat and making her moan. He'd picked up a slow rhythm as he thrust his hips against hers, pushing her against the wall while his hands wandered the exposed skin of her torso. When he kissed across her shoulder, pushing her torn short aside, Hermione leant forward a little and trailed soft kisses against his throat.

She marvelled at the softness of his skin, and at the warmth of him since she had often looked at him and though him cold. Burying a hand into his silky blonde hair Hermione whimpered a little as he kissed lower, moving out of reach of her lips as he moved down to press sensuous kisses over her chest. Hermione couldn't believe what she was letting happen when she let him skim his nose over her cleavage and she moaned softly when his hands tightened on her lower back as he kissed his way down her left breast along the edge of her bra, across the valley between her boobs and then pressed hot kisses up the right breast in such a way that Hermione couldn't help thinking about doing things with him that she couldn't take back.

Things liking giving her virginity away to Draco Malfoy kinds of things. Hermione couldn't believe she was even thinking it, but as her eyes rolled back in her head in pleasure at the way he was making her feel, she had to admit that it definitely crossed her mind.

* * *

**A/N: Hey everyone. Thanks for reading. Pretty please leave me a review so I know what you think of the story so far. Thanks to everyone who has reviewed. Much Love xx-Kitten.**


	4. Red and Yellow Roses

**Red and Yellow Roses**

Draco Malfoy quirked an eyebrow at the sight before him. He was on his way to his last class of the week, Ancient Runes, and as he turned into the corridor that led towards the classroom, he wasn't entirely certain he could believe his eyes. Coming down the hallway towards him was the brown eyed witch he'd spent every second evening for the past month kissing.

He had to smile as he watched her. She wasn't paying any attention to her surroundings or even to where she was going. Because as Draco Malfoy leant against the wall to watch, Hermione Granger spun in a neat little waltz step turn. She had her eyes shut and her head bopped a little as though to imaginary music as she danced her way down the corridor all alone. He could tell from the way she swayed a little as she did it, that she was completely off in her own world.

Her overstuffed bag swung in a wide arc around her when she took a few more steps before twirling back the other way as she came on down the corridor. After a month of kissing her, Draco still had a thing for her. Part of him suspected that every time he kissed her it was just getting worse, hooking him and entangling him in an intricate web of intrigue that she alone seemed to possess. He'd thought after a little while, the thrill of doing something so forbidden as kissing her would wear off and he'd stop feeling so drawn to her. He'd been wrong.

Every time he kissed her, he just wanted to do it again. Which was why he hadn't gotten to bed until the wee hours of the morning after patrolling with her last night. Because every time he moved to pull away from her so that they could both go to bed, he couldn't resist dipping his head for another taste of her sweet mouth, another inhalation of her intoxicating perfume.

Hermione kept right on dancing as she came down the hallway, not even looking up to see if she might run into anyone. As she got closer he could even hear her singing a wordless song to herself as she danced.

"Ya dat da da, Ya dat da da, Ya dat da da da dat da dat da da."

As he watched her do another twirl he couldn't resist stepping into her path and Hermione stopping singing abruptly as she twirled to face forward and suddenly collided with his hard chest.

"Oops" she said, eyes apologetic and lips poised to makes excuses or amends for her behaviour until she caught sight of him. She'd caught hold of both his forearms to steady herself and keep him from falling in case he hadn't been bracing for the impact of her bumping into him and as Hermione Granger looked up into Draco's eyes he saw them flash with recognition instantly.

"It's you." She said, smiling widely as though she couldn't be happier to see him. They had a standing arrangement that whenever they were anywhere but on patrol, they pretended like they hadn't been kissing each other for a month, but as she grinned at him she looked like seeing him was something she had planned on and looked forward to.

"Fancy moves Granger." He smirked at her.

"I think I did well considering I've never taken a dance lesson and had no dance partner" she told him, still smiling brightly. Draco laughed at the cheeky smile on her face before he watched her lean out around him without moving her feet. She peered down the corridor behind him before straightening and looking over her shoulder. She still hadn't let go of his arms where she'd grabbed him in their collision and Draco quirked an eyebrow at her as her eyes twinkled with mischief as she looked back up at him.

He just about died in surprise when there in the middle of the corridor Hermione Granger- Gryffindor, mudblood, his supposed enemy- went up on her toes and pecked him on the lips. She smirked at him as she pulled away, letting her hand slide down his arm until she caught his left hand in hers and lifted it, singing to herself again as she twirled beneath his arm.

Draco turned, stunned by her actions when she dropped his hands as she twirled away from him and kept dancing right on down the corridor. He was even more curious when she stopped right outside the classroom door, straightened her skirt and readjusted her bag on her shoulder. He was moving towards the classroom too when she glanced at him, still smiling brightly, bit her bottom lip seductively, winked at him and then disappeared. Curious as to what had put her in such a good mood that she would kiss him in the middle of the corridor when anyone could catch them he walked faster towards his class.

By the time he strode inside she was seated towards the back, alone. She had her books, ink, quill and parchment out on the desk in front of her and she was reading a novel still humming to herself if he had to guess.

"Ah Mr Malfoy, excellent" Professor Babbling said cheerfully "We'll be working in pairs to decipher and excerpt from a tome I came across recently. I'd like you to work with Miss Granger please?"

Draco was unsurprised to hear this, all term so far Professor Babbling had asked him to do just that every time he walked in. He didn't know what was going on with all the professors or why they were all so interested in pair work this year, but Draco couldn't say he minded having to go over and drop down into the seat next to Hermione.

He'd been right. She was still humming to herself and the book she was reading was a paperback with a plain black cover and golden letters down the spine. The scent of her perfume wafted towards him as he sat there next to her, pretending not to watch her. He'd gotten very good over the last month at making it look like he was ignoring her even while he watched her. When professor Babbling handed out the five foot long scroll of parchment filled with tiny cramped Runes, Hermione put her book back in her bag and flipped open her rune dictionary.

She kept humming and Draco was surprised that he didn't find it annoying. Over the past month they'd become masters at pair work, not only because they patrolled together so often, but also because when they weren't patrolling they were forced to work together in class all the time. Hermione didn't actually speak as she pointed at a cluster of runes on the parchment with the feathery end of her quill and then leaned towards him to point at the contents page of the Magical Hieroglyphics textbook he had just opened.

Fifteen minutes later her soft hand gently stopped his before he could mark the parchment he was deciphering.

"Wait…." She was frowning in concentration and didn't let go of his hand right away.

"What Granger?" he asked her quietly when she kept frowning at the translation he'd just found and the set of Runes he was translating.

"I think…. Does this look like it's supposed to be off over here by itself, or do you think it's part of that cluster?" she asked him and Draco was once again shocked at the way she genuinely asked. She wasn't sarcastic or condescending, she was puzzled and asking for his opinion. She didn't do it very often, this was only the second time, and he couldn't help but smile to himself just a tiny bit.

He frowned down at the paper again, noticing the way she still hadn't taken her hand away from his. He knew he should wiggle it to make her let go, but he kind of liked the soft warmth of her skin against his.

"It looks like it's supposed to be part of the cluster." He replied "Which explains why my translation wasn't making proper sense."

"At first I thought it was a separate word, but I can't find the Rune in my dictionary." Hermione agreed.

Like they always did, Hermione and Draco finished their translation correctly before anyone else did, but Professor Babbling was never one for giving early marks, even on a Friday afternoon. While he wrote up the prescribed homework for the weekend, Draco watched Hermione pulled out a blank piece of parchment and draw a hash symbol on it. She grinned at him before drawing an X in the middle box and offering him her quill.

Draco was surprised. Normally when they finished early she would begin their homework or she would read one of the many books she carried around in her bag. Quirking an eyebrow at her, he took the offered quill and drew an O in the left hand box next to her X. Hermione smiled sweetly at him before she drew an X in the box above his O. He blocked her from making three by taking the bottom corner and Hermione put another X in the opposing bottom corner, Draco blocked her again, and then Hermione blocked him.

She giggled when they both realised no one was going to win the game.

"Smarty pants." She whispered, still giggling. She took the quill and drew a whole bunch of dots on the parchment and then a single line connecting two of the dot. Recognising the game as boxes he took his turn. They went back and forth until Hermione had twelve boxes and he had eighteen. He smirked triumphantly at Hermione but she just started humming to herself again and then bit on her bottom lip.

Curious as to what had put Hermione in such a good mood that she would kiss him in the corridor, dance along by herself and be humming and smiling so much, Draco quirked an eyebrow at her. Her eyes twinkled wickedly as she wiggled her eyebrows at him several times, grinning like a fool. He snorted at her in amusement. Taking her quill from her again he scribbled a question on their gaming parchment.

_**What's put you in such a good mood?**_

_I got a parcel in the post today._

_**So?**_

_So? You wouldn't be saying that if you knew what it was!_

Draco stared at the infuriating witch while she wiggled happily in her seat. Hermione giggled again.

_I think I might make you wait until patrol tomorrow night to find out…._

She wrote when he just stared at her expectantly. Draco snatched the quill off her.

_**You owe me for earlier….**_

Hermione giggled again before letting her hair fall forward over her shoulder to block the view of Professor Babbling and the rest of the class. Then she stuck her tongue out at him. She still hadn't told him what it was when the bell rang and she started stuffing everything back into her bag.

Spilling out into the hallway Draco walked away, not entirely certain whether he could still hear Hermione humming or if she'd gotten her little tune stuck in his head. He turned into a deserted corridor and was halfway down it when he realised that it wasn't in his head.

"It's getting awfully easy to sneak up on you Malfoy. You better be careful, if a noble Gryffindor like me can catch you off guard, imagine what the other snakes in Hogwarts might do if they found themselves at your back like this." Her voice was a little bit husky and Draco froze as soon as she started speaking, realising she'd pulled her wand on him and currently had the tip pressed against his back.

"You and you're damned humming" he growled, not moving.

"You thought it was just stuck in your head, didn't you?" Hermione giggled from behind him as she lowered her wand.

"I think I'm going barmy." He admitted when he turned to look at her.

Her school tie was loose around her neck and she'd undone the buttons of her shirt enough that he could see a hint of her cleavage.

"I think you already were and you just didn't know it" she told him cheekily.

"How do I keep ending up in deserted corridors with you?" he asked, ignoring her comment.

"You're just lucky I guess." She grinned up at him "But this time it was because I was following you."

He raised his eyebrows at her questioningly.

"I have something for you." She told him.

"You're not going to kiss me again are you?" he asked her warily. Not because he didn't want her to, but because his father would literally have his head if they got caught.

"Maybe later" Hermione smirked up at him. He watched her reach into his bag again. "Don't you want to know what came in my package today?"

"You said you weren't going to tell me" he shrugged at her.

"Oh… well if you don't want to know…" she made like she was stuffing something back down in her bag and began to turn away from him. Draco reached out and caught her wrist. Hermione giggled again.

"I placed an order for some book a week ago." Hermione told him with a smirk "They came today."

* * *

**Hermione **watched Malfoy's eyes twinkle with curiosity as she drew a paperback novel with a black cover and gold lettering out of her bag. Last week he'd exhausted her collection of trashy muggle novels, so Hermione had done some research and found a wizarding equivalent of the smutty muggle books. They'd arrive in the post this morning.

"What is it?" he asked her curiously when he found that the title was all in French. He spoke French, and could read it, though not very well so he knew it said Wandering Wands, but there was nothing else on the cover.

"You'll have to read it and find out." Hermione smiled at him.

"I'm not very good at French, Granger" he admitted.

"Good thing that only the title is in French then isn't it?" she grinned.

"Just tell me what it is." He snapped, clearly irritated with her sarcasm and bubbling happiness. Hermione suspected e wasn't used to being around someone who felt as happy as she did for such a long time period.

"The title is a code. English wizards are old fashioned and the idea of trashy literature getting into their bookstores is apparently abhorrent. But, the French have no such objections. The black and gold cover is code to them that it's a trashy novel, and the French title deters English wizards from picking them up." Hermione told him, still brimming with happiness in spite of him snapping at her.

Suddenly Malfoy's grey eyes lit up "No more asking you what a tele-phone or a microwhatsit is?" he said, suddenly gleeful.

"If you'd taken Muggle Studies you'd know what they were. Or if you weren't such a pompous snot, you might have a few muggle born friends who'd tell you about these things." Hermione chastised him, still grinning. Malfoy rolled his eyes at her, she said the same thing every time he asked her what some muggle contraption was.

"You tell me what they are." Was all he had to say to that. Hermione laughed as she watched him thumb through it.

"Where are you going?" he asked her when Hermione turned and began to walk off down the corridor without another word. She stopped and looked back at him.

"To dinner." She replied, baffled as to why Malfoy was suddenly asking her that.

"It's this way…" he said, pointing to the way he'd been going.

"It's that way if you're going to long way." Hermione argued.

"There's a short cut to from here to the Great Hall?"

"No, but there's a short cut between here and third floor that avoids a lot of traffic and a lot of uncooperative stair cases." She told him.

"Show me?"

Hermione liked the way it came out as a request rather than a demand. If it had been Harry or Ron they would've demanded. Draco Malfoy might be a nasty little snot to everyone around his Slytherin friends, but when he was talking to just Hermione in that husky murmur that he so often used to seduce her, he almost always managed to find his manners. The huskiness made her want to kiss him again but she also kind of thought it was sweet when Malfoy spoke to her like they were friends, like they'd spent every second night for the past month kissing each other.

She smiled at him and waited for him to catch up to her before she led him around another corner and over to a landscape portrait of the grounds. Hermione marvelled at his polite, gentlemanly behaviour as he held it open for her. He slid it back into place behind them and Hermione grinned at the familiar feel of sexual tension that suddenly appeared between them as soon as they were alone in the darkness.

"Can I ask you something?" Hermione asked him quietly, hoping he wouldn't react badly. Over the last month they hadn't exactly become friends in spite of the kissing, mostly because they had such differing personalities and neither wanted to spark a fight. She jumped a little bit when she felt him take her hand and give it a squeeze.

"What do you want to know?" he asked.

"It's going to make you mad…." Hermione cautioned the blonde boy "But sometimes I find myself wondering why you act like such a jerk around the rest of the world, when you're actually sweet."

"The same reason all pureblood kids act the way they do" he responded, not sounding mad at all "We all have an image to maintain, a family legacy and reputation to keep. For some of us it's more important than others."

"So it's just because you're a Malfoy?

"Just? There's a little more to it than that Hermione." Malfoy told her "Pureblood children are taught that no matter what, family is everything. It's drummed into us from the cradle that we are better than others, especially those of us from rich families. We're told its prestige, but mostly it seems to be about making sure everyone feels inferior by being afraid of us."

Hermione raised her eyebrows in the dark as they slowly descended to stairs. He was still holding her hand and he sounded… strange. The Malfoy she knew from last year would have said it was because he was better and richer and more powerful because he was a pureblood… yet now he said it was just what he'd been told to believe as though he didn't quite believe it anymore.

"But…. I don't think people are afraid of you. When you're with the other Slytherins maybe they are, like Crabbe and Goyle because they're so imposing…." Hermione said, not sure whether she should keep talking in case she offended him.

"Most of the school are afraid of the Syltherins actually…. It's generally you Gryffindors who are too proud and stubborn to admit you're afraid of anyone. Or too stupid to be afraid."

"But why should we be afraid? I'm not afraid of you." Hermione told him.

"I noticed." He said stiffly "And that's bad. Of all people you should be."

"Are you threatening me Malfoy?" Hermione asked, tensing up and stopping abruptly.

"No. But as I so wonderfully point out all the time, you're not a pureblood or even a half blood. I don't know where the obsessive hatred came from originally or why it's supposed to be such a big deal anymore. Mostly it seems like an excuse for the twisted purebloods to pick on people who aren't as rich or as willing to delve into dark magic." Malfoy said bitterly.

"Are you ok Draco?" Hermione murmured, surprising both of them by using his first name. "It's not like you to sound so… unconvinced of the nonsense you spout."

"Hermione…. I….. I don't know what to do." He said in a soft voice that made him sound incredibly vulnerable.

"Don't know what to do about what?" Hermione asked him, shocked when she felt him move as she realised he'd dropped down to sit on the dusty steps of the passageway.

"My life…" he whispered.

Alarmed, Hermione crouched down next to him.

"He's been to my house…" Malfoy admitted softly "Being that close to him you can feel that he's twisted, evil. He's not all there. He wants everyone to bow down to do his bidding, not just mudbloods and halfbloods, but purebloods too. He killed Goyle's uncle last week because he failed to do something he was asked…. The Dark Lord has everyone convinced that he'll share his power, that he's got the right idea about making people who we've been taught to believe are beneath us, being just that."

"You've spent the past four years saying that Malfoy." Hermione reminded him.

"I'm an idiot." He told her bluntly "He doesn't give a damn about anyone but himself, he wants dominion and power and he'll kill anyone who get's in the way of that. The others don't understand that when he's conquered you lot, he'll turn on us…"

"You're as afraid as the rest of us…" Hermione breathed, shocked to her core at the revelation.

"Not really," Draco Malfoy murmured back to her "Just… disappointed."

"With whom?"

"My parents. My father for buying into everything and teaching me to be the same way. My mother for being too much of a pureblood wife to stand up to him. Myself, for being such a prick and spouting such bollocks for so long. And my parents some more for ever getting involved with Him. There's no getting out Hermione… for any of us. We put on a front, most of the others even believe, but not all. I think maybe they know deep down that he'll turn on us eventually so most of them just do what they're told in the hopes that it won't displease him."

Hermione listened avidly, wondering what was going on inside his head that had him reneging on the faith he'd always shown in his Father and in how much better he was than everyone.

"When he came to our house, I think my mother realised that. Father welcomed him with open arms, but I saw the fear in my mother's eyes when she looked at me. We're all just pawns in his play for power. I can see it already as he tries to gather followers. He has a method for it. If he doesn't think you're a worthwhile wizard, he kills you, but with some he offers them the chance to join him. If they refuse he flips and kills them, and the ones who say yes… they've still got to earn it. I think even Father might be realising that lately. The Dark Lord kills indiscriminately when he becomes displeased with someone. Failure is weakness punishable by death."

"So why do you still say those terrible things and torment people?" Hermione whispered to him.

"I don't have a choice. loyalty is everything with families like mine. If I walked away, my own father would kill me for such cowardice."

"Sounds a lot like the captain taking the whole crew down with the ship." Hermione tsked. "Why are you telling me this Malfoy?"

"I don't know…" he admitted so softly that she barely heard him. "Last Christmas I looked at you and I had to have you. I don't know why… I know the thrill was part of it, you're supposed to be off limits. But then I kissed you… and now I can't stop."

"Why did you? That first time… why did you?"

"I don't know. Even when I grabbed you I still didn't know why. All I knew was something inside me got riled up when Krum bid you goodnight, and the only way to stop the monster inside me roaring was to kiss you."

Hermione held her breath as he said that, realising suddenly that there was a chance everything she knew about Draco Malfoy was wrong. How could the snobby, uptight, nasty boy she'd been tormented by for the past four years suddenly be changing his tune so drastically? As she squatted there next to him in the dark passageway she couldn't even see his face, but Hermione suddenly realised something.

"Can I tell you a secret?" Hermione asked him.

"I've told you plenty."

"I… I'm glad you grabbed me that night. I was angry about it at the time, angry and mortified because it was you and you hate me so much. I thought you'd tell everybody what an idiot I was to let a stranger grab me and kiss me like that. But it was everything a first kiss is supposed to be. I'm glad it was you who kissed me first."

"Careful Granger" he said mockingly "We're in danger of turning this into a girls sleepover with all this confessing."

"Well then we'd better make it so. I like you when you're like this. When you're being sweet and polite instead of being a jerk who thinks he's better than everyone else." Hermione told him. His grip on her hand changed subtly as Hermione admitted that to him.

She'd been kissing him all month, and somewhere along the way Hermione realised she might have a thing for him, but as the words came out of her mouth Hermione realised that all the tender, hot, passionate kisses he'd given her had definitely wormed there way under her skin. A very small part of her with a whispery voice had started to suggest that maybe she even fancied him.

Trying to shake off the foolish thought, Hermione got to her feet, tugging gently on his hand and helping him to his feet. They walked in silence for a little while longer and Hermione knew they were coming towards the exit from this passage. Malfoy seemed to know too because he tugged her to a stop.

This time he didn't press her into the wall as he let go of her hand. He didn't pull her to him or ravish her in a moment of passion. His hands came up to cup her cheeks softly and Hermione realised he'd moved around to stand on the step below her in front of her. She couldn't see him, but she felt his cool breath on her face as he leaned towards her.

When he kissed her he did it slowly. His lips didn't take possession of hers, instead they asked permission, brushing softly like the soft flutter of a butterfly's wings against her lips. His kiss was deliberate and lingering, his tongue tender as it stroked against hers. It was unbearably sweet and it filled Hermione's tummy with butterflies. This was the type of kiss she would expect a boyfriend to give her. One that made her feel special, as though she was being cherished. This kiss didn't make her feel like he just wanted her, it made her feel like he might be feeling the foolish things she was feeling.

Hermione couldn't deny it as Draco slowly pulled away. That whispery voice in her mind suddenly had a loud voice and it was presenting her with all kinds of evidence that pointed towards her fancying him. She fancied Draco Malfoy! Hermione felt a blush crawl up her cheeks and was thankful that he couldn't see her face in the dark passage.

"Hermione" Draco breathed to her "You should know that out there when I say horrible things and I do cruel things…. I don't mean them. Not anymore…. And it's all because of you."

Hermione felt something spark inside her chest as he murmured those words to her, the butterflies in her tummy riled happily and she blushed when he pressed a kiss to the back of the hand he still held before he let it go and stepped out onto the third floor. Hermione let him go ahead of her, knowing they couldn't keep publicly spending time with each other. A little part of her wept at that thought, because fancying a boy who had to pretend to hate you and who you couldn't tell your friends about was sad. She wanted to tell Ginny about the butterflies and the way her heart kept skipping a beat, but she couldn't.

When she got to the Great Hall she watched the way his changed his gait from a walk to a sauntering kind of swagger and she realised that it really was all a front. He might blame her for the fact that he didn't mean his insults anymore, but as she watched him rearranged his facial features from a sweet smile to a sneering sort of smirk, Hermione realised that who Draco Malfoy was and who he pretended to be for the world were very different people.

* * *

**Draco **Malfoy spent the following day roaming Hogsmeade. He'd received a letter that morning from his father, urging him to do whatever was necessary to maintain a high standing with Umbridge and keep the Ministry from thinking that the Malfoy's might be in league with the Dark Lord, let alone that they were harbouring the world's evilest wizard within the Manor. His friends understood how letters from home affected him and they had chosen to do their own thing when he'd told them he was going somewhere they didn't want to go.

His father's letter made him angry. Until he'd started kissing Granger and gotten to know that there was more to her than bushy hair and her know-it-all ways, he had blindly believed everything his father told him. Even when he'd seen the fear in his mother's eyes during the Summer when the Dark Lord had come to the Manor, he'd let his father dictate how he should treat anyone who wasn't family or a useful ally.

But everyday he spent time with the wavy haired witch he'd been taught to hate, Draco realised how just how much bollocks his father had been feeding him. Hermione wasn't inferior just because he parents were muggles. She was incredibly smart and funny and pretty. She tolerated his nonsense and didn't push if he snapped at her, she leant him things even though he'd been nothing but rotten to her for the entire time he'd known her. She wasn't even afraid of him. He especially liked that about her. Even his friends were afraid of him, afraid of his money and his family and of what he might do to them. But not Hermione Granger.

Hermione was fierce and independent and strong. She was incredibly skilled with a wand and when no one was around to see them, she looked at him like he wasn't the gormless little blighter he so often acted like. She did things that surprised him, like yesterday when he'd caught her dancing by herself down the corridor. Draco liked that about her, he liked that she showed emotion in everything she did. When she was in class she was passionate about each subject and about learning. When she argued with the ginger haired weasel she let herself be riled up, arguing her points with that same passion. When Draco kissed her, she didn't fight to keep him from knowing if something he did to her made her feel amazing, instead she expressed it.

If he was being honest with himself, he would probably have to admit that he'd begun to fancy her for her passionate personality.

Draco found himself conflicted over that. He'd been raised to hate her, but he was learning that his father was more than a little dozy when it came to judging character. It bothered him that if he were to admit even to himself that he fancied her a little, he could never publicly announce it. He might be able to pull her into broom cupboards and kiss the daylights out of her, but it wasn't like he could take her on a date or walk her to class or anything else. Something like that would get back to his father faster than he could say 'Quidditch' and then Draco would probably wind up on the wrong end of the Killing Curse.

It made him angry, Draco decided as he glared around the interior of whatever little shop he had walked into. He was angry at his parents for raising him this way and dragging them all into the coming war fighting for what Draco was beginning to suspect would be the losing side. Because even if the Dark Lord won the world wouldn't be a nice place. It certainly wouldn't be the kind of place where he could ever admit to fancying a muggle-born. He glared down through the glass display case he leant against, his fists clenched in frustration and that was when he spotted it.

Soon the wizarding world would be torn apart by War. Draco knew that. He knew the Dark Lord was amassing an army to overthrow the Ministry and weed out any sort of resistance to the blood mania nonsense he was spouting. And he knew that when that time came, Draco would have to stand by his idiotic father because stupid or not, they were family. Family came before all.

But until then, Draco Malfoy would see what he could do about tasting true happiness. He would defy his father even if the man never knew, and as he stared down at the object he had spotted in the display cabinet, Draco realised he wanted to do something more than pull Granger into broom cupboards. Publicity of anything between them wasn't an option, but there were different levels of publicity. If his father knew about him kissing Granger, he'd be disowned, if not beaten. If her friends knew she'd been kissing him, she'd be outcast and disparaged. Actually advertising that there was anything between them at all would be downright foolish. But maybe he could give her something to tell her that what had been happening between them meant something to him. That she meant something to him. And he'd found just the thing to do it

He waved his hand at the wavy haired wizard behind the desk and pointed down at the object he couldn't take his eyes off.

"Give me that please. I want the box it comes in as well. Don't wrap it."

* * *

**A/N: Big thanks to everyone for their reviews. I'm glad you're all liking the story. please let me know what you think of this chapter. Much Love xx-Kitten.**


	5. Belles of Ireland

**Belles of Ireland**

Hermione blushed a little bit as she walked through the darkness with Draco Malfoy on her heels. Every night while they patrolled, he liked to walk behind her instead of next to her and Hermione suspected it made him feel like he was protecting her. It used to make her nervous because he'd been her childhood tormenter and rival, and because he walked so silently that she never actually heard him walking even though he was right behind her. Having him at her back had felt strange at first, but she'd grown used to it over the last six weeks of patrolling with him four nights a week.

At first she had thought it was unfair that she and Malfoy had to patrol so often when Ron only patrolled two nights a week, but when she'd asked Professor McGonagall about it, she'd been informed that Anthony, Hannah, Draco and her were the tops of the class and could handle the responsibility of so much time spent on prefect duties without it interfering with study. However, Ron and Pansy weren't quite as gifted, and so had to do less. Professor McGonagall had assured her that next term the amount of time prefects spent patrolling would be decreased because of the pressure of O.W.L.s and Hermione had been pleased to hear it.

On silent feet, Draco Malfoy stalked her and Hermione couldn't help but think about how much she liked it. She'd learned a lot from Draco Malfoy in the past six weeks, which was why she had been admonished by Ron today when he'd suddenly been startled to find her next to him. Being around Draco had taught her how to be sneaky, how to move without making a sound, how to speak without being caught in a lie while still withholding information. She'd also gotten pretty good at outright lying since she had to give reasons for why she looked so pleased some mornings or why something bothered her when her friends didn't know what it was, because they didn't know how closely she paid attention to Draco.

They were almost finished their patrol for the night, and Hermione could feel herself begin to blush as she reached for the ladder to climb out on top of the Astronomy Tower to check that there were no students out of bed and hiding on top of the Tower. Last week they'd caught a pair of seventh years snogging up there. It made Hermione blush to think of how many times Draco Malfoy had snogged her up there beneath the stars and she'd felt kind of bad when she'd sent the couple on their way. If she was being honest she wouldn't have like to be interrupted while she was snogging Malfoy and she'd known the couple hadn't been pleased either.

As she lifted the door that led to the roof Hermione caught her breath. It was almost a full moon, and by some miracle there were only a few wispy clouds in the sky. Hermione held onto the railing at the top of the tower and tipped her head back to look at one of her favourite views in the world: the bright twinkling bed of stars winking back at her.

She had always loved the stars. There was something magical about them. Something that made her forget about all the worries of life, all her regrets and all of the bad things. When she looked up into those twinkling little lights, all Hermione had ever been able to feel was happiness and an assuredness that whatever was written in the stars about her was something positive. They made her feel like everything would be alright, and as the year went on, Hermione found herself needing to look at them more and more frequently. Darkness was coming, evil was building beyond this castle's walls, but when Hermione looked at the stars she forgot about that for a little while.

"You look beautiful when you do that." Draco's voice murmured to her from off to her right. Hermione smiled to hear him compliment her. He'd started doing it after the talk they'd had in the passageway two weeks ago, but every time he did so Hermione still felt special.

"When you look at the stars, what do you feel?" Hermione asked him without taking her eyes off the sky.

"Small. I feel small" Draco told her.

"But what else? Why do you love them?" Hermione pressed.

"I feel like there might be something better than this world out there. Like all my problems don't matter for a little while" he told her. "But I love them because even when I feel like I'm all alone, they're always there like burned out eyes winking back at me."

Hermione was surprised to hear him say that.

"What about you Hermione. Why do you love the stars?" he murmured to her, sounding closer.

"They make me happy. There's something in the way they shine that makes me feel like everything will be ok. It's like…. When I look at them, everything else falls away. Nothing else matters for a few minutes, not school or homework or my friends, not my parents and the danger they're in because they have a daughter who's a witch. For just a minute or two, the beauty of them takes my breath away and I just know everything will be alright." Hermione told him passionately.

For a moment Draco didn't say anything, but when he did, Hermione stopped breathing.

"That's how I feel when I look at you, Hermione."

It was a whisper on the wind and for just a moment Hermione was sure she'd imagined it, but as she slowly dragged her eyes off the stars and turned her face to look at him, she realised he'd actually said it. He was watching her with his face tipped downwards a little bit, as though expecting her to laugh at him.

Hermione felt the butterflies in her tummy begin to flutter with nerves and with how much she fancied him. Since she'd admitted it to herself two weeks ago, Hermione knew her feelings for him had been growing. Every night they spent together and every time they were paired together in class, Hermione realised she was fancying him more and more.

It was wrong. She knew it was wrong. Wrong and twisted and a completely foolish thing to do, but in spite of the logical, reasonable arguments she had put forward when she lectured herself, she still fancied him. When she saw him her heart skipped a beat, when he crept up behind her to start patrol she always found herself smiling. And when he kissed her…. Hermione couldn't get enough of being kissed by Draco Malfoy.

The way he made her feel with just a touch was like nothing she'd ever felt before. She felt jittery and excited and like she wanted to do more with him than kiss him. It was foolish and pathetic, but a part of Hermione wanted Draco Malfoy to be her first everything. He'd been her first kiss, he'd been the first to run his hands up and down her back and over her tummy, the first to bury his hands in her hair as his passion bubbled out from beneath the tight lid he kept on all of his emotions. There was an incredibly dreamy, girlish part of her that wanted Draco Malfoy to be her prince charming. To have him sweep her off her feet and make her fall head over heels in love with him, like the girls on the Disney films she had watched as a child. That incredibly silly part also liked to pretend that such a romance could end in happily ever after and Hermione knew logically that it was impossible and likely to cause her a broken heart. It seemed that an entirely different part of her which Hermione was beginning to suspect might be her heart, didn't care at all about her logic or reason, or about the risk of getting hurt.

Hermione stared at Draco Malfoy, his blonde hair glowing in the moonlight, his fringe falling into his grey eyes. He was watching her warily, tensed as though he expected a blow or laughter and rejection from her. She didn't know what to say to his statement, though it made her feel giddy with happiness, and yet when she opened her mouth to say something, Hermione was surprised by what came out.

"When I look at you I get butterflies."

* * *

**Draco **Malfoy lifted his head when he heard Hermione Granger admit that so bravely. She said it simply, as though stating a fact, yet he saw the surprise on her face as she realised what she'd said. He knew she was blushing though he couldn't really tell in the moonlight.

He didn't know why he'd said what he had to her.

All he knew was that every time he saw her, his stomach did a somersault and he felt like smiling instead of sneering. He felt better when she was around. After he'd bought her the gift he'd seen two weeks ago in Hogsmeade, he'd been carrying the damned thing around in his pocket, trying to think up the words and to find the courage to tell her that he fancied her. And every time he'd thought of a way, the words had lingered on the tip of his tongue while he cloaked himself in cowardice, worried she didn't fancy him back.

"Really?" he murmured to her, eyes wide with shock and wonder.

She had clapped her hand over her mouth as though she couldn't believe those words had come out. But at his question she very slowly nodded her head. Draco wondered where she found the courage. In spite of their shared kisses and how awful he'd been to her, the girl he'd spent the past four years demeaning and telling her she wasn't worthy to breathe the same air as him, looked him in the eye and nodded as she admitted that he gave her butterflies.

Confusion flooded him, and self-doubt joined the party, trying to convince him that he didn't deserve her and that she was just saying so because she could see how pathetically enamoured with her he was and she worried he'd get angry if she said no. Draco fought against the doubt, and in two strides he moved across the roof towards her, catching her in his arms and pulling her gently against his chest. His heart was pounding wildly and he felt a little giddy. He marvelled when she timidly wrapped her arms around his middle, she didn't squeeze him tight, but she held him firmly.

When she snuggled her face into his neck, he felt her take a deep breath in and he wondered if she was addicted to his cologne the way he was addicted to the scent of her perfume.

"I have something for you Hermione." Draco whispered to the girl in his arms, wondering if touching her was the equivalent of borrowing some of her courage since he suddenly felt calm and like everything was going to be ok. The feel of her hugging him had completely blocked out the voice of self doubt in his head.

"What do you mean?" she murmured into his collarbone while one of her hands snaked it's way up his back inside his shirt.

"I bought you something…." He told her softly "A belated birthday present."

"You know when my birthday is?" she asked, sounding astonished.

"It was the nineteenth of September, wasn't it?" he asked, clarifying.

She nodded against him. She didn't move to pull away from him and for a long time he just held her like that, wanting to give her the gift he'd bought, but not wanting to let her go. A little voice in his head was whispering that he never wanted to let her go and the beast inside his chest purred in agreement.

"Why did you buy me a present?" She whispered uncertainly "You don't even like me."

Draco pulled back from her then, not letting her go, but leaning back so he could peer down into her wide brown eyes. She looked beautiful in the moonlight, her creamy skin absorbing the pale light and her eyes twinkling with reflected stars.

"I do like you Hermione… I….. I think I have a thing for you" Draco whispered to her, borrowing her courage as he told her the truth. Her eyebrows shot up and her mouth fell open in shock. But she held his gaze even as she shyly replied.

"I think I have a thing for you too."

Draco felt a smile split his face and he couldn't resist brushing the back of his hand down her cheek tenderly. Hearing her say those words sent a zing of happiness surging through his veins. Leaning down, he captured her lips trying to show her how much he fancied her with just one kiss. She met him at every turn, tongue sweeping against his with such passion that he could tell she was trying to do the same thing he was.

"Draco…?" Hermione breathed when he kissed his way down her neck "This is crazy!" her voice was breathy and husky, and when he pulled away from her he could see her hunger for him shining in her eyes.

"What am I doing?" she murmured, glancing away from his eyes and biting her bottom lip absentmindedly as her incredible brain tried to adjust to the information that she was kissing her enemy, an enemy who fancied her back. Draco couldn't help wanting to kiss her again to see her do it, but he knew they'd need to discuss things now.

Up until now they had snogged each other senseless, they had rubbed up against each other and he'd even torn her shirt open that day in the broom cupboard. And not once in all that time had they ever discussed what was happening between them or what it meant. He'd told her why he kissed her that first time, and that she was as addictive as forbidden fruit. They'd never even had to discuss not telling anyone they'd been snogging because it would be foolish for both of them to do so.

"Hermione….. I don't understand why I can't keep away from you. But every time I kiss you I realise all over again that I fancy you." He admitted huskily.

"So do I… " Hermione said softly "But… I mean it's not like we…" she trailed off awkwardly.

"I don't like saying this Granger," Draco told the girl, releasing her and taking a few steps back "But we both know that the wizarding world is headed for outright war, and as much as I don't like it, we both know we'll end up on opposing sides when that happens…."

"We don't have to be." Hermione whispered.

"Yes we do Hermione. You can't leave Potter alone in this, he won't survive if you do. And I can't just turn my back on my family. They're right fools for getting so tangled up in all this, but if I walked away, the Dark Lord would hunt me down and then he would make my father murder me while my mother watched. He might even kill both of them for good measure since disloyalty is unacceptable." Draco told the brown eyed witch looking at him sadly. He could see that she knew it was true, as he did.

"So you'd rather let him turn you into a Death Eater?' Hermione asked him, that familiar flame of anger burning in her brown eyes.

"No." Draco told her "The last thing I want to do is that! But if I don't do it then I'll die."

"The Order could protect you" Hermione started to say but Draco held up his hand to stop her.

"And if they did, He would kill my parents Hermione. I don't have a choice in the matter. If the Dark Lord wants to turn me into a Death Eater, all I can do is smile and pretend I'm honoured. I can't walk away from my family. It's ingrained too deep that family has to come first Hermione. No matter what, family comes first." Draco told her.

"You could have just told me you didn't want to kiss me anymore." Hermione said bitterly, turning away from him. Draco wanted to growl in frustration. How could he make her understand that he was a fool who fallen for the girl he was supposed to despise. How could he tell her that he wanted to spend time with her, that he wanted to get to know her until he knew her better than she knew herself? How could he make her understand that even though he wanted that, he'd eventually have to walk away from her to keep all of them alive?

"But I do…. Hermione I just told you I fancy you… more than you think. Too much. I know I should stay away, that I should try to go back to just hating you and tormenting you. But I can't. I can't keep away from you."

"What are you trying to say here Malfoy?" Hermione demanded without looking at him.

"The war is inevitable Hermione, and you need to know that when it breaks out properly I'll have to walk away as though you mean nothing to me. I won't like it, but I'll do it if it means me and my family get to stay alive. But until then…."

Slowly Draco pulled the velvet box out of the pocket of his robes. Silently he opened it and carefully extracted the treasure inside.

"Until then…. I fancy you Hermione. Every time I see you I can't keep my eyes off you and my hands itch to touch you. I want to be with you." He murmured the words into her ear while he slid his hands around the neck, fastening the gift her had bought her at the back of her neck. The long goblin-made silver chain gleamed in the moonlight and Draco Malfoy smiled at the sight.

* * *

**Hermione** held her breath as she felt Draco slide something around her neck. She'd almost forgotten that he had said he'd bought her something as a belated birthday present. But she didn't look don't at whatever charm or pendant hung around her neck. Not right away. She was too busy listening to his voice echoing in her head telling her he fancied her and wanted to be with her.

"What?" she whispered "What did you just say?"

"That I want to be with you." He murmured huskily into her ear "Will you be my girlfriend Hermione Granger?"

Hermione froze. She must be dreaming. Surely she must? Draco Malfoy would never in a million years ask her to be his girlfriend. There had to be a mistake. Even if hearing the words did make Hermione's heart skip a beat and make her stomach do a swooping kind of somersault in an expression of happiness. But even as the girly, silly part of her brain celebrated with an odd looking victory dance, the logical part of Hermione was poking holes in such a romantic notion.

"How exactly am I supposed to do that when you can't even speak to me civilly in front of your friends Draco?" Hermione asked him softly. She hated herself for saying it, but she would hate herself even more if she foolishly agreed only to point all these things out later.

"I don't know…" he murmured, sounding sad "The same way you spend time with me now."

"But you just said you're going to walk away" Hermione whispered "How can I be your girlfriend when you can't even look at me and when I know you're just going to walk away and break my heart?"

Draco didn't say anything. Instead the arms he had wrapped around her dropped away and he stepped backwards from her. Hermione instantly felt bad for hurting his feelings, and for being insensitive as she tried to look at this situation logically.

"Draco…" Hermione caught his hand as he turned and tried to walk away "I'm not saying no. I'm just trying to understand exactly what you want here?"

There in the moonlight Draco Malfoy looked back at her and Hermione could see the feeling shining in his eyes. See how much it had cost him to ask her to be his girlfriend and how much it hurt him to think she was rejecting him.

"I don't know Hermione. I don't even understand it. It's like, I know I should just walk away and stay away from you. I should just go back to be a prick and pretending I don't give a damn about you. But I can't. Every time with you, it's like I can be someone else. I can be someone who actually shows he has feelings, someone who cares about more than the bollocks I've been fed my entire life." Draco told her, his fist clenching and unclenching "Whenever I do anything these days, you're there in my thoughts. When I say something mean I can picture the way you'd frown at me for it. When we patrol I can't get enough of you, and I can't get enough of the way you make me feel like I'm not a scary, rich tosser. The way you make me feel like I don't have death hanging over my head if I step too far out of line. I don't know how it could work Hermione… it's not like I could hold your hand and walk you to class or take you on a date to Hogsmeade because we'd both be shunned by our friends for it. The problem is that I want to. I want to do those things with you."

Hermione stared with wide eyes at the blonde haired, grey eyed, pointy faced boy from Slytherin who had first started calling her a mudblood and had wished for her death. She watched in fascination as he flipped the lid off the container of his feelings and let them spill out into her hands. Lately she'd been thinking she would like to do those things with him too, which was why she had so riskily kissed him in the corridor outside Ancient Runes two weeks ago. It was a ridiculous notion, but she wanted it.

Instead of responding right away, Hermione looked down at the necklace he'd fastened around her throat. On a long silver chain hung a pendant that took Hermione's breath away. It was a seven-point Lucky Star, roughly the size of a sickle and it sparkled in the moonlight. As Hermione picked it up to inspect it, her breath caught because she realised that not only had be bought her a lucky star necklace, but he had bought her a diamond lucky star pendant. The star shaped diamond was plated at the back with silver and Hermione could feel something engraved there. When she turned it over and squinted at it in the moonlight, Hermione realised it was an ancient rune, one they'd gotten stuck on a few weeks ago in class. It meant Believe.

"Oh my gosh" Hermione breath as she studied the rune before turning it over and studying the glittering diamond "Draco…. You can't give me this… it's too expensive" she protested, unable to take her eyes off the beautiful necklace. Even without the diamond pendant, the silver was beautiful enough to stare at forever.

"Why not?" he asked, sounding bitter "With the coming war you going to need all the luck you can get. That's goblin-made silver chain and plating imbued with Felix Felicious to make it a good luck charm. The seven points on the star make it a powerful one because seven is the most powerful number. With what's coming, you'll need all the luck in the world and then some….. It's fine Hermione, you don't have to be with me just because I bought you that. It was a birthday present. Besides, it has another meaning to me anyway." He told her before he turned away again and started to leave.

"What meaning Draco?" Hermione asked, catching his hand again to stop him from leaving. He just glared at her, not wanting to answer since she'd apparently hurt his feelings with her logical questions.

"Please tell me." Hermione asked him, interlacing her fingers with his on the hand she was using to restrain him before reaching out and catching the other one. She peered up at him pleadingly when he set his jaw stubbornly. Eventually he relented under the skilful use of her puppy-dog eyes.

"When I'm near you, you make me believe everything will be ok. You make me believe I'm a worthwhile bloke; that I shouldn't just off myself. You make me believe that Light is the right way even though all I've been taught is Darkness. You make me believe Hermione."

As Hermione looked into his handsome face, she felt something inside her melt.

"So… what exactly would being the girlfriend of Draco Malfoy entail?" Hermione whispered, stepping closer to him until she was pressed against him while still holding his hands. She watched his eyes widen in surprise and watched him smile, but he made no move to pull her closer.

"Hermione…. If we're going to do this…. We need to make a few things clear. Now. Before anything else gets in the way." He said seriously and Hermione could see that her logic had sparked his own clever mind to things that might be problems for them to be together.

"What things?" Hermione whispered nervously.

"I need you to accept the fact that when the time comes, I have no choice but to walk away." He said.

Hermione stared up at him sadly. She knew that would be hard. How could she date him, possibly end up in love with him, and still let him go towards a life of evil and darkness and possibly his death? How would she be able to keep from trying to draw him towards the right side? How could she keep from trying to save him?

"I… We could protect you… all of you…" Hermione said.

"No. My father is too far into it to ever get out, and nothing the Order of the Phoenix could do would save us from the Dark Lord." Draco told her seriously "I can't avoid it and if you can't accept that one day I'm going to walk away and commit unspeakable crimes in order to save myself and my family, then we can't be together."

Hermione bit her lip unhappily.

"I wouldn't ask you to walk away from Potter or Weasley, Hermione. Their survival hinges on you sticking with them. I'm going to ask that you extend me the same courtesy and never ask me to walk away from the people I love."

When he put it like that, Hermione could see that there was no way she win this point. And her foolish heart didn't care at all about how much it might hurt her when he had to walk away, it was already on board with the idea of him being around.

"What else?" she asked.

"We have to keep it a secret. Your friends will desert you if they ever find out, just like my family would me. Even if we're together we can't be together publicly." Draco told her sounding as unhappy about it as Hermione felt.

"Then why did you give me this?" Hermione asked him. She knew he was right, but she didn't like these rules. They made her angry and sad. And the fact that he had given her such an amazing gift wasn't exactly subtle.

"Because you need the luck, and every time I see you wear it, even if we're not together, I'll remember that I don't believe all the bollocks. That you changed me and made me believe in rightness and happiness and friendship. Maybe someday during the war I'll look at you across the battlefield and see this glimmering around your neck. And when I do it will remind me that once upon a dream, an angel believed I was worthwhile and good, that someone like you changed me and taught me that hatred and prejudice are wrong. When that happens maybe I'll be able to believe enough that I'll do something drastic and life-changing again like I did in falling for you."

Hermione wanted to cry to hear him say it, and she knew that she'd never ever take this necklace off. There on the top of the Astronomy Tower Hermione looked into the eyes of the boy she wasn't supposed to fancy.

"Then I'll never, ever take it off." She whispered to him. Draco smiled at her.

"You won't have to worry about anyone taking it from you if you don't. It's also imbued with binding magic that makes it so that only the owner and the person who bought it for them can ever take it off. If anyone else were to try…. Well something particularly nasty would happen to them" Draco told her. "If you do take it off, unless you give it back to me or pass it on to someone of you bloodline, anyone else who wears it will be on the receiving end of the inverse of the good luck it's supposed to bring you."

"What do you mean? If I took it off and it got lost, if someone else picked it up and wore it, they'd have bad luck instead of good?"

Draco nodded at her "I…. well I wanted to make sure no one could ever force you to take it off and then use it against you."

"You put all these charms on it?" Hermione asked, astonished. Draco nodded again and Hermione felt like something inside her had just clicked into place. Not only had he given her something valuable, he'd given her something that might save her life in the coming war.

"They weren't charms though, Hermione" he admitted "They were curses."

"Why would you give me a cursed necklace?" Hermione asked him, realising that the horrible things he spoke of happening if anyone tried to take it, could possibly be death or something worse.

"It's not cursed. At least, the curses won't affect you."

"But why would you put all these curses on it in the first place? And how did you do them?" Hermione pressed, yearning to know. Draco watched her for a moment.

"Hermione, if I'm standing up here asking you to be my girlfriend while telling you that someday I'm going to have to walk away to fight on the bad side of a war while you fight on the good side, don't you think I might care about you enough that I want to make sure you'll always be ok? Even when I'm not around to make sure you are?" Draco asked her softly. Hermione felt her heart give a little squeeze. He really cared about her.

"You don't think I could take care of myself?" Hermione asked, lifting her chin to stare into those watchful grey eyes.

"I think that you could save the whole world Hermione. But there's nothing wrong with making sure no one hurts you when you try." Draco told her "Look Hermione, this war targets all kinds of people, especially Muggle-borns and you're muggle-born. We both know that someday all too soon we'll have to walk away from each other and pretend to be enemies as we fight a war because some sociopathic, schizophrenic nutjob has no soul and thinks that people like you don't deserve to live. I care about you too much now to someday see you on the wrong end of a killing curse or being raped and tortured and abused just because your parents were muggles."

Hermione held her breath as Draco Malfoy spoke, and she wondered how she had affected him so much that he would think of making sure she would be safe and protected in the war. She wondered how much he fancied her that he would do this. As though he could read her mind, Draco kept talking.

"The past six weeks, I've gotten to know you Hermione. I know how passionate you are, how loyal and brave and fierce, and I know that if someone tried to attack you, you'd do a good job of fighting them off. But there are people on the dark side who would see someone like you as nothing more than something to toy with. The people on the bad side of this war have no conscience Hermione. They won't just stun you or even kill you. I know people now who would love to degrade someone like you. They'd rape you and use you, beat you and torture you in horrific ways just to hear you scream and watch you cry." Hermione felt a chill in her blood at his words. "And someday to save both of our lives I may have to stand there and let them do that to you. I can't do that. Right now Hermione, I consider you my friend, albeit my friend who I fancy and the only one I have…. The point is, I couldn't just stand there and let someone hurt you. A necklace like this draws attention. It's big and shiny and looks incredibly valuable because it is. An attacker would go for it, trying to take it from you. When they do you'll find yourself with a chance to escape, and it'll bring you luck."

Hermione couldn't believe what he was saying.

"Why would you do this for me Draco? Six weeks ago you would've dance to hear I was dead." Hermione asked.

"No I wouldn't have. Since that first kiss I've felt like I'm being drawn to you. You're the only real friend I have. The only one who isn't just my friend because of who I am and who my family is. I want you to always be safe." Draco said seriously, there was a final ring to his voice as though he didn't want to talk about this anymore. Taking the hint, Hermione switched back to the conversation at hand.

"So even though you've given me something that must have been incredibly expensive and is incredibly valuable and will apparently protect me from all kinds of things, we'd still have to keep it a secret from the world that we're something other than enemies?" Hermione asked him. In her heart Hermione knew they would have to keep this a secret. To tell the truth would be catastrophic for both of them and as she looked into the eyes of the boy who had given her such an amazing gift and then asked her to be his girlfriend, Hermione realised that even if they had to lie and pretend it wasn't real, she wanted the chance to know him completely.

Draco just nodded sadly as he held her hands and let her lean against him. Hermione sighed. She would have to lie about where she got the necklace.

"Anything else?" Hermione asked bitterly "Because right now it mostly sounds like we have to pretend that we hate each other even when we don't, and as though we're both just setting ourselves up for a broken heart since you're going to leave anyway." She wanted to cry in frustration at the whole situation because she really wanted to be with him, but it seemed a little pointless.

"You make it sound barmy when you say it like that" Draco smiled down at her gently "I know it seems a little pointless, but with the coming war hanging over us and so much bad happening in the world…. I guess I wanted to see what it was like to have a little bit of good in my life."

Hermione felt her heart squeeze.

He was going to walk away from her and leave her broken hearted and crying. He would be on the wrong team in the War they all knew was coming and he might even end up on the wrong end of a curse. But as Hermione looked up into his eyes, she could feel in her soul how much the liked him, she could feel how easy it would be to fall in love with the sweet boy she had discovered lurking beneath his prickly exterior and Hermione realised she wanted that.

Someday soon she might be the one on the wrong end of a killing curse, and Hermione realised there in the moonlight that if that ever happened, she'd like knowing that she had loved someone and that someone who definitely wasn't supposed to, had maybe loved her back just as much. The day might come all too soon when either she or Draco might never draw another breath and Hermione realised that she would kick herself everyday for the rest of time if she didn't take the chance with him now.

She had read somewhere that: To live is to love as though there is no such thing as heartbreak, to love is to let yourself freefall into the unknown and hope to heaven that someone will reach out and catch you.

They wouldn't have forever and Hermione knew as she looked into his eyes that there wouldn't be a happily ever after for their relationship. But they did have right now and Hermione hoped that that would be enough.

* * *

**Draco** watched the witch he was already falling for make her decision. He could see it in her eyes, the exact moment when she decided to throw caution to the wind and let herself be with him.

They weren't risking their reputations or risking losing their friends because no one could ever find out about them being together. But in his heart Draco knew that someday all too soon he would have to walk away from the passionate, fierce little witch in his arms in favour of a life he'd never signed up for yet was bound to. And when that happened, Draco Malfoy wanted to be able to have memories of happiness and light to call upon, he wanted to be able to know in his heart that he'd done something worthwhile. Something that made him happy and made him a better person than he would've been without Hermione Granger in his life.

Hermione went up on her toes, pressing her lips to his in what he suspected might have been the sweetest kiss she'd ever given him. She didn't slip her tongue into his mouth, didn't bury her hands in his hair or rub up against him. Instead she held his hands and let her lips sweep against his softly, tenderly, timidly. It was sweet and chaste and left the lingering taste of strawberries on his lips. When she stopped, she leant her forehead against his and looked into his eyes.

"I may not get to keep you forever" she whispered, smiling softly "But maybe we can make a little while feel like forever."

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for all the reviews. Let me know what you think of the story and of this chapter. Much love to all of you xx-Kitten.**


	6. Celandine

**Celandine**

Hermione slept late on Sunday morning. She had been up far too late the previous night as she and Draco Malfoy worked out a way in which a relationship between them might work. Still curled up in bed with her face buried beneath her pillows, Hermione couldn't help but smile. She was incredibly happy today. In spite of all the odds and the fact that it was insane, she was in a relationship with Draco Malfoy.

The blonde haired boy who had tormented her for years was now her boyfriend. Hermione was still reeling from the fact that he had actually asked her to be his girlfriend and part of her was convinced that it might have all been a dream, but as she lifted her head, Hermione felt the slither of warm silver around her neck and felt the soft impact as the Lucky Star pendant around her neck bumped against her chest.

The chain wasn't excessively long, the pendant resting against the flat of her sternum directly above the valley of her cleavage but as Hermione sat up slowly, she couldn't help pulling the diamond out so she could stare at it in awe. It must have cost Draco a small fortune to buy this for her and Hermione was touch by the sentiment. she still couldn't believe that as well as spending so much to buy her a good luck charm he had also imbued with all kinds of magic, curses and potions and binding spells that meant that if anyone but Hermione or Draco tried to pull it from her neck they would encounter a sticky situation.

When she'd asked him how he'd done all of the curses he'd refused to tell her some of them, claiming they were much too dark for her to ever know about, but he had told her that he'd ensured it would only be possible for him or her to remove the necklace with binding magic. Hermione had been surprised when he'd told her anyone from her bloodline could wear it and receive good luck because last week when she had clumsily fallen and scraped her palm he'd swiped a few drops of her blood, feeding it to the goblin-made silver. He had refused to tell her any of the curses that would befall anyone who tried to take it from her, or how he had made it so that he could take the necklace off her without allowing anyone else of his bloodline, and Hermione had realised that Draco Malfoy was probably smarter than her.

She found that interesting and annoying because she enjoyed being incredibly clever. All he would tell her about how he was so clever was that he'd had _Thorough and Extensive Instruction_ in everything magic related. From the way he had narrowed his eyes as he said it, Hermione suspected that he'd been instructed in a great many things that he hadn't cared for.

When she climbed out of bed and got dressed, Hermione noticed the way the light from the lamp by her bed caught the beautiful diamond around her neck and made it sparkle as bright as the star it was shaped to look like. Smiling to herself for what the necklace represented, Hermione did her hair before leaving the dormitory. No doubt Harry and Ron would still be in bed even though Hermione had overslept herself, so she didn't even bother to look for them in the common room.

As she walked into the Great Hall Hermione jumped in surprise. Just as she entered, the bewitched ceiling flashed with a bright strike of lightning followed by the rumble of thunder. As she stared up in surprise, Hermione wondered when the fierce storm had blown in. Last night there had only been wispy clouds in the sky, but now the sky was heavy with black clouds and thick with raindrops. But even the raging storm couldn't dampen Hermione's spirits as she all but skipped over to the Gryffindor table.

"Hello Neville" Hermione said happily as she dropped into the empty seat next to the forgetful boy. He was eating his breakfast while he stared at a small plant in a pot.

"Hi Hermione" he said, almost absentmindedly as he poked at the plant with the handle of his spoon and watched it wiggle as though he had tickled it. Realising she wasn't going to get any intelligent conversation out of him while he had a plant to study, Hermione reached for the pitcher of pumpkin juice and poured herself a glass.

She was happily enjoying her breakfast whilst reading the trashy paperback she'd had in her back pocket when someone dropped down into the seat next to her.

"Hermione, did you know that Draco Malfoy is staring at you?" the voice of Ginny Weasley asked her.

"What?" Hermione said, her head snapping up to look first at Ginny and then across the hall to meet the grey eyes of her new boyfriend. Ginny had been right, even though he was sitting with his cronies eating breakfast, he was staring at her across the hall. To anyone else it might look as though he were glaring at her, but Hermione could see the way one side of his mouth was quirked a little higher than the other making his smirk lopsided. Hermione wanted to smack herself in the forehead as she thought about how handsome it made him seem. When she met his eyes she stared right back at him and his smirk grew wider.

Hermione realised instantly that it was his way of greeting her this morning and she kind of like the way his grey eyes flicked down to the diamond she wore and then back up at her eyes. She smiled when she realised that he was probably also eyeing the fact that the muggle top she wore wasn't exactly a turtle-neck. The blue long sleeved sweatshirt dipped towards her cleavage to reveal the swell of the top of her breasts, and providing the perfect frame for the large diamond tat adorned her throat.

"I wonder what his problem is." Hermione said to Ginny, biting her lip on a smirk of her own as she looked away from her smirking boyfriend towards her best female friend.

"Who knows? He's such a git that he's probably staring at your cleavage." Ginny sneered as she glanced for a moment at the top Hermione wore. Hermione rolled her eyes at the disapproving tone in Ginny's voice. It had been Ginny who suggested she buy this top in the first place.

"Oh my gosh Hermione!" Ginny exclaimed as she caught sight of Hermione's new jewellery "Where did you get? It's so beautiful."

Hermione smiled at her friend, last night she had thought up a lie to tell her friends since she couldn't tell them it had been a gift from her boyfriend Draco Malfoy. She'd decided the most believable story would be to tell them that she had a wealthy spinster Aunt who had recently passed away and had left her fortune to her only niece.

"Oh…. Mum and Dad posted it to me. It came late last night, an Aunt I didn't really know passed away last week." Hermione lied smoothly "She was a wealthy old spinster and she left all of her possessions to me. She never had children of her own, and my dad was her only nephew. Since most of her things were incredibly feminine and girly, mum and dad thought it would be best to pass everything on to me. I did some research and apparently this is actually a Lucky star, powerful in the wizarding world for the seven points, not to mention the fact that it's a diamond."

"It's so beautiful" Ginny breathed, staring at it as though she'd never seen anything so beautiful in her whole life.

"I don't think it's got many carats as far as gemstones go, but I didn't want to just leave it lying around, you know? Do you think it's too much to wear every day?" Hermione asked her friend.

"No. No you couldn't just leave it lying around or locked away. It's beautiful, but it's not overstated or anything. I'm sorry about your aunt though." Ginny reassured her. Hermione pretended to smile sadly.

"I didn't really know her" Hermione said before quickly changing the subject "What have you been doing with yourself anyway? I feel like I never see you anymore. You've always got Quidditch or homework or I have prefect duty and homework. I feel like the only times I see you these days is at DA" Hermione whispered the last part as they both stared around to make sure no one had overheard them.

"It doesn't help that when I'm not at Quidditch or class or doing homework, I've been spending time with Micheal" Ginny added before taking a large bite out of her toast. "And I had been thinking the other day that we should try getting you a boyfriend too Hermione, but then I'd never see you." Ginny told her.

Hermione coughed as she choked on her pumpkin juice. What could spur Ginny to suggest Hermione find a boyfriend, the morning after she'd actually found one.

"Are you alright?" Ginny asked when Hermione coughed and coughed.

"Yes…" Hermione gasped "You just surprised me. Please don't try and set me up with anyone. I don't have time for a boyfriend. This is OWL year. I don't want to distract from my studies, and besides, there's no one I'm really interested in romantically."

Ginny's eyes twinkled with mischief and Hermione held in her groan. Things would get awkward in a hurry if Hermione refused to go on dates with anyone that Ginny tried to set her up with. Mostly because she would have to say no to keep her new boyfriend happy, which would baffle her friends. And if she said yes to dates to keep Ginny from getting suspicious, she could just imagine the reaction Draco Malfoy would have at hearing that his girlfriend was going on dates with other boys, even if they were fake ones.

Adjusting to being in a relationship with Draco was difficult and over the following months, Hermione often found herself fuming at her boyfriend. The logical part of her knew he had to say and do nasty things to maintain his image with his friends so his family wouldn't disown him. But the emotional side of her was regularly outraged by his behaviour. Their biggest fight was after Umbrigde had inspected Hagrid's class with the Thestrals. Draco hadn't exactly said anything particularly horrible, but he hadn't been kind either. When she'd run into him as they left the class, it had taken all of her energy not to slap him across his pretty pointed face.

But when she had confronted him about it he had apologised for it. Then he'd pointed out all the reasons he had to do and say awful things, especially that day since Pansy had grown suspicious that there had been something going on in Draco's life. Something romantic. Hermione had groaned in frustration to learn that her foolish boyfriend had forgotten about a love bite Hermione had left on his collarbone and that pug-faced cow had spotted it.

Hermione regularly found it hard to reign in her emotions and assess everything logically, instead of letting the fact that he was sweet with her in private dictate how they should behave in public. On more than one occasion she'd lost it, especially when Malfoy had started a duel with her friends in the corridor. That time she had hit him with a tickling jinx. On another occasion he said something particularly foul within her earshot and Hermione had instantaneously hit him with a Bat-bogey hex. He hadn't been impressed with her that evening on patrol duty.

In spite of their rocky situation, Hermione could feel herself falling for the blonde boy. When he wasn't pretending to hate her and her friends and everything they stood for, he was sweet and kind to her, he made her laugh more than anyone else ever had. Hermione especially loved when they had animated discussions about things, such as the time they had discussed whether or not werewolves should be further regulated by the ministry, or whether or not the legal age to obtain an Apparation license should be lowered. He was well informed on quite literally everything unless it was muggle related and Hermione liked the way he made her challenge her own beliefs as much as she had him challenging his as he offered a very different opinion to hers countless times. One of her favourite things about being with Draco however, was that he never let her walk away from him angry. After years spent fighting with Ron, Hermione found it refreshing to be able to talk to him openly and even disagree with him, without having the discussion turn into a shambles. Draco never let the fact that she might not share his opinion rile him up, though he had gotten quite animated one evening as they discussed the worthiness of Quidditch as a wizarding sport.

Even when he did things that made Hermione mad, Draco never let her storm off in a huff and never let his emotions interfere with any important discussion they might have. She found herself falling for him even more because he was mature enough to keep a tight leash on his temper and clever enough to have worked out exactly what kinds of things to say to keep her from screaming at him.

Whenever they were alone, Hermione still couldn't get enough of the way he made her feel with just a touch and on more than one occasion she found herself collapsing dreamily into bed in the wee small hours. She often dreamed of what it might be like to try some of the things she read about in her trashy novels, but other than unbuttoning his shirt and running her hands over his tight torso, Hermione hadn't pushed things with him. She found him all the more endearing for not pushing her either. There was a big part of her that was nervous about all the sex related stuff, since she was literally experiencing everything for the first time with him. She often fantasised about what it might be like, but she liked the fact that Draco didn't push her if she stopped him because he went a little too far.

Whenever they were alone together he was a complete gentleman. He held doors for her and last week when she had tripped, he'd been right there to help her up, pressing a kiss to her scraped palm before healing it for her. Every time he did something so sweet and wonderful, Hermione could feel herself melt for him even more and she knew that he was quickly winding his way into her heart.

* * *

**Draco** Malfoy Glanced across the classroom to where his brown eyed girlfriend sat with her hand in the air, waiting for Snape to acknowledge the fact that she knew the answer to the question he'd just presented to the class. He marvelled at how alert she looked this morning even though it was the first class of the day and it was a Friday. No one wanted to be there today. Not with just two days separating them from Christmas break.

Hermione had even spent all of last night pressed up against him in a broom cupboard snogging him stupid as he'd torn her shirt open and run his hands over her lithe, soft body. It had been four in the morning by the time Draco had kissed her goodnight and let her walk away from him even though all he wanted to do was drag her down to his bedroom suite in the dungeons and have his wicked way with her. She made him so incredibly horny that he'd been crossed eyed with every awkward painful step he'd taken away from her last night.

In spite of that, here she sat running on less than five hours sleep looking bright eyed and bushy tailed as she waved her hand a little trying to draw his godfather's attention to the fact that she knew the answer. She always did. And Snape always curled his lip and pointedly ignored her, yet Hermione kept throwing her hand into the air every time. Draco had no idea how she was doing. If it had been him, Draco would've given up by now. Not to mention the fact that since she apparently got up at six in the morning every day she was quite literally running on two hours of sleep.

In spite of that, her school tie was neat and snug around her neck, her buttoned shirt hiding from view the diamond she hadn't taken off since the day he'd given it to her months ago. She had make up on her throat to hide the love bite he'd left on her last night, and wore her heavy knitted Gryffindor cardigan beneath her black school robes to fight off the snowy chill of the castle. He had no idea how she looked so bright and alert. Her hair was neat and shiny, her sweet lips looked warm and inviting with just a hint of gloss catching the dim lighting of the dungeon. She never wore make-up on her face and Draco smiled as he admired the dusting of freckles across her cheeks. He kind of liked that she had the confidence to not wear make-up and the sense not to mar her beauty.

He still couldn't believe a girl like her had ever agreed to be his girlfriend. Christmas was just days away and for the past two months Hermione Jean Granger had been the girlfriend of Draco Malfoy. And Draco knew he had it bad for her. So bad in fact, that he had considered staying at Hogwarts for Christmas just so he could spend time with her, but apparently she was supposed to go skiing- (whatever that was)- with her parents this Christmas so he'd had to resign himself to the cruel truth that he wouldn't get to see the object of his affections for more than a week.

It was going to drive him crazy. The idea of not being able to kiss her every other night felt almost painful, especially when he considered the fact that he would have to go home and listen his mother and father going on about how people like Hermione didn't deserve the right to use magic, that they should be regulated by the ministry, or even rounded up and killed. The thought of it made him sick. He'd have to pretend that he agreed with them, and if his godfather was right, he'd have to do a damn good job of completely closing his mind. The Dark Lord might not know that the girl in his head just so happened to be Hermione Granger- the muggle-born witch who was best friends with Harry Potter- but it wouldn't take him long to find that out and reveal the truth to everyone. That would send his world anticlockwise and then his clock would probably stop ticking permanently. Draco didn't know how they hadn't been caught yet when it was all he could do to drag his eyes away from Hermione, but since he didn't fancy the idea of death, he'd have to build a big indestructible box within his mind and put anything and everything that related to Hermione in that box if he wanted to live.

It would be hard though, especially since it would need to be a massive box to hold every thought he had about her, every memory he'd built with her, every touch he'd shared with her. Everything about her would be locked away inside his mind where no one could ever have access to it. Some of the things he knew about Hermione would be things that her enemies would love to use against her and Draco would never allow anything to hurt the girl he cared so much about. She was his to protect and for some unknown reason she had decided to trust him with her secrets. Draco would do anything he could if it meant that no one could ever hurt her or manipulate her. Especially no one as twisted and evil as the Dark Lord.

Draco detested the idea of going home where he might run into the sociopathic wizard. He dreaded the thought of having his father ask him about Hermione and her friends and what trouble they might be stirring up. But as he looked at Hermione across the classroom, he let those thoughts slip away. They could wait until later, when he didn't have the chance to watch her. He loved to watch her, the way she lit up with excitement as she laughed or glowed with anticipation as she waited for a teacher to call on her to answer a question.

"Malfoy!" the voice of his godfather hissed at him, snapping Draco's attention away from Hermione "What is the key ingredient in a Befuddlement Draught?"

Draco let his lip curl at his godfather for snapping at him.

"Sneezewort" he drawled, lounging against his desk and oozing boredom as he looked up into his godfather's glaring black eyes. Snape didn't give him any house points for knowing the answer, just narrowed his eyes at him and went right on teaching the class. Draco peeked at Hermione as she slowly lowered her hand, looking slightly disappointed that Snape had refused to acknowledge her again. She bit her lip looking irritated and when he asked the next question, Hermione didn't bother to raise her hand.

It felt odd to suddenly watch her give up, even though he'd been wondering why she hadn't done just that years before since Snape had probably only called on her twice in their five years of schooling. It was like watching something drain out of her and Draco found himself growing angry with his godfather for doing that to the girl he cared about so intensely.

When the day ended, Draco slipped away from his friends knowing that when in times of sadness, anger, happiness or doubt, Hermione Granger found solace within the library. It took him a long time to find Hermione, and when he did he raised his eyebrows in shock. In a dark corner of the library, Draco watched Hermione step over the rope that sectioned off the restricted section of the library and disappear among the shelves of restricted book. Wondering what she could be doing, Draco followed her on silent feet, glancing around to make sure no one would spot him.

It took him even longer to find her once she was in the restricted section because it was so dark. He had no idea how she could be reading since she hadn't lit her wand. She was curled up in the windowsill with a book on her lap, though how she'd gotten up there he had no idea. There was nothing she could have used to climb up onto the sill where it jutted out from the wall five feet up. She had a stack of books next to her and he watched from the shadows as she scanned the index for the information she wanted. She skim read it when she flicked to the page, and Draco felt his eyebrows rise as he watched what Hermione did next.

"Do my eyes deceive me?" He murmured to her, still standing in the shadows. He had to hand it to her, Hermione didn't even jump in surprise when he spoke and when she looked up she looked directly at him "Surely Hermione Granger wouldn't be stealing a school library book from the restricted section without borrowing it and without permission?"

But she was. He'd caught her putting the book into her usually stuffed bag and she grinned at him sheepishly when she realised she'd been caught.

"What are you doing here?" she asked him softly. Draco felt himself smile at the way her cheeks dimpled as she smiled at him adoringly when he stepped closer to her.

"What am I ever doing when I come to the library, Hermione?" he asked her rhetorically.

"Studying?" Hermione cocked her head to the side "I didn't know you were so dedicated to your schoolwork that you would be studying this evening instead of celebrating the end of term."

Draco chuckled "Mon Amour, the only reason I ever come to the library is when I'm looking for you."

Hermione smiled at him and Draco could tell that she liked the term of endearment he'd picked for her.

"Why are you looking for me?" Hermione asked him as Draco walked closer so that he could stand in front of her. She had turned towards him, her legs hanging down the wall from where she perched on the windowsill. The sexual tension that always burned so brightly between them spiked when Draco ran his hands up her thighs, standing between her legs and smiling up into her face.

"You looked sad when you left class…" he murmured to her, his grey eyes searching her face for some explanation to how she was feeling.

He had it really bad for Hermione Granger, so bad that he'd wanted to hex his godfather for upsetting her in potions that morning. All day he'd been worried about her, because since this morning she'd stopped thrusting her hand into the air in class.

"Were you worried about me, Mi corazón?" His girlfriend asked him and she sank her hands into his blonde hair and tipped his head back so she could look into his eyes. Draco felt his heart give a squeeze in his chest. He didn't speak the language that she'd picked her endearment from and when he'd asked her what it meant she had refused to tell him, but he loved to hear her use it. Whenever she did he could see her feelings for him shining in those secretive brown eyes and it made him realise that he might have it bad for Hermione, but she had it bad for him too.

Draco nodded his head, trying to keep his hands from wandering as he rested them on her thighs. They itched to touch her, tingled as he thought about what it might feel like them if he slid them up under the heavy fabric of her uniform skirt. She wore thick tights, but the idea of touching her is new and exciting places made his body tingle with longing.

"Why are you stealing a restricted book?" He asked her in a whisper, trying to distract himself from his wayward thoughts about other positions they could land themselves in that would involve her legs wrapping around him.

"Because I need it. A little extracurricular activity that isn't exactly approved of under so many new Educational Decrees" Hermione told him honestly.

"You're going to get in trouble Hermione. Umbridge will get you writing lines with your own blood if you're not careful." Draco warned her, not at all liking the idea of that sadistic bitch hurting his girlfriend that way.

"That's why I'm not using the traditional route for getting the information I need, silly. The only way I'll get in trouble is if you tell on me and you're not going to do that." Hermione told him, gently massaging her fingers against his scalp. Draco let his eyes slide closed in pleasure at the feel of them. Merlin, he loved her touch. He loved the way it simultaneously made him feel completely paralysed, even as his body tingled pleasurably.

"I don't want to not see you over Christmas. I don't like being away from you" Draco told her softly, his eyes closed as her touch started to bring him undone.

"Well, I'd invite you along to come skiing with me and my parents, but I think Ron and Harry might catch on that there's something going on between us if you climb into the car with my family at King's Cross." Hermione smiled at him.

"You'd actually invite me?" Draco asked her, surprised.

"Why wouldn't I?" she asked.

"Well, don't your parents know how rotten I used to be to you?"

"No. They don't really know much about anything that happens here at school. They have trouble with the magical side of things. If I were to go home and announce I had a boyfriend, they'd be thrilled. If I were to announce that my boyfriend has hexed me on more than one occasion…. To them it would the equivalent of me being in a violent, abusive relationship."

"Why?" Draco asked, cocking his head to the side in confusion.

"Because to them, a hex would be an attack. In their minds duelling is like fighting. They have trouble understanding that when I hex you and give you antlers, you can just go to Madame Pomfrey and have it fixed. Besides, if I told them that my boyfriend also happened to be the one responsible for my teeth, I don't think they'd be all that welcoming of you." Hermione giggled.

"What are you talking about?" Draco asked, thoroughly confused now.

"Do you remember last year when you hit me with that Densaugeo hex?" Hermione asked him. Draco nodded, smirking just a little bit at the memory. "Well, when I had Madame Pomfrey shrink my teeth, she told me to stop her when I thought they were back to normal, only as you might remember, they were too big to begin with. So I let her keep going, shrinking them down so that they were regular size and I didn't have buck teeth anymore. I'd been begging my parents to let me do it for ages and they refused since they think teeth and magic shouldn't mix. They're dentists so anything teeth related is important to them. When the saw me after that, my teeth weren't as big and they weren't very happy about the fact that I had magically altered them instead of continuing with my brace."

"Sometimes when I talk to you" Draco told her sounding baffled but adoring "I feel like you're speaking a completely different language. Do you enjoy flaunting your higher intelligence?"

"I do actually" Hermione grinned at him "Besides, it's your own fault that you are so woefully ignorant of muggle terms and ways. Who knows, maybe you'd like knowing about all the fascinating things muggles have invented to get by in life without the gift of magic."

"Careful Granger" Draco growled at her softly as she spoke to him so condescendingly "Don't make me punish you for thinking you're smarter than me."

Draco watched the heat flood her gaze at his words and felt his todger twitch to see it. Merlin, she could drive him insane with just a hot look and Draco knew as he stared up at her where she perched on the windowsill, biting her lip and watching him with those hungry brown eyes, he was in trouble. He'd never known anyone like her, never felt like this about anyone else.

"And how exactly would you punish me, Mi Corazón?" She asked in a husky voice. Draco felt like he was going to poke a hole in his trousers, he wanted her so badly. In response, Draco granted his hands permission to explore her body and Hermione's hands tightened in his hair as he easily slid them up beneath the folds of her skirt.

**Hermione** quivered as heat raced through her veins. In the time they'd been together, Draco had snogged her senseless, kissed his way across her chest and up and down her neck. He'd run his hands up and down her back and caressed the soft skin of her stomach on nights when he barely controlled his passion and need for her, tearing her shirt open to get at the treasures inside. One night a few weeks ago, Hermione had even let herself do the same thing, unbuttoning his shirt shyly and letting hands caress his smooth alabaster torso hungrily. She hadn't been able to resist running her hands over his tight abs and had even pressed a soft kiss to his left nipple.

But they hadn't really gone any further. He often thrust against her, making her want so much more than the touching they had shared. But Hermione didn't particularly fancy the idea of going further in a smelly broom cupboard or out in the open on top of the Astronomy Tower where anyone could interrupt.

She held her breath on her gasp of surprise as Draco's warm hands travelled up her thighs, raising goose pimples all over her body. Her thoughts instantly jumped to the hot love scenes in the trashy novels she and Draco shared and Hermione bit her lip at the idea of enacting some of those scenes with him now. Desire pulsed through her, thick and heady, and Hermione felt her legs wrap around her boyfriend, ankles locking at the small of his back.

Hermione held still as his hands travelled up the top of her thighs, they were warm and familiar yet foreign to that part of her body. When he trailed them back down her legs, he let his hands slip inwards to rest on her inner thighs. The centimetres that separated his fingertips from the centre of her body felt like miles and Hermione was dying to close the distance.

"Draco" she breathed, yearning adding a rich huskiness to her voice "Punish me more.

She couldn't believe the words were coming out of her mouth but as she uttered them, Hermione couldn't find it in her soul to even want to pull them back in. She opened her eyes to stare into the stormy grey eyes of her boyfriend and she could see her own hunger reflected and reciprocated within them. Merlin she wanted him and as he crept his fingers a little bit higher, Hermione couldn't help thinking back to her thought from months ago. She wanted Draco Malfoy to be her first everything.

Slowly she leant down and captured his lips, hungrily devouring his with her own, nipping and sucking at his bottom lip, spurring his fingertips to close the distance to her pulsing nether peach. Hermione gasped as he trailed his fingers lightly against the centre of her body. Her knickers and her uniform tights kept flesh from meeting flesh, and Hermione cursed the fabrics for their existence. Still, the feel of being touched there by Draco Malfoy did strange things to Hermione.

Heat spiked through her, straight to her nether region and Hermione bit her lip as she suddenly felt warm dampness between her thighs. Using her grip on him, Hermione scooted her hips forward slightly and she gasped at the increased pressure of Draco's thumb against the entrance to her lady garden. She kissed him harder, yearning and need filling her completely and wiping away any other cohesive thought. How did he always make he feel so incredibly fantastic?

**Draco **smirked against Hermione's lips when a soft moan escaped her. He swallowed the sound hungrily. His thumb pressed against the spot between Hermione's legs and he slowly began to rub firm circle against the bard bud he found there. Merlin he loved it when she completely let go of all rational though and all logic to just let herself feel. He loved the way she did it so fearlessly, letting him unravel her as she rode a rollercoaster of pleasure with such abandon.

He slowly pulled back from kissing her so he could watch her face as he did these things to her. A fierce burning in his chest wanted him to vanish her tights and knickers so her could touch her properly, but Draco suspected that if he did that, he'd end up with his trousers around his ankles and his todger buried deep inside her right there against the wall before either of them could form coherent thought as to why that wouldn't be such a good idea.

As he watched Hermione bite her lip and let her head fall back in pleasure, he could see the ecstasy written all over her face and could only assume that he was doing something right. Merlin, the sight of her like that had him so hard that it hurt and he knew that tonight he'd have some new material to play with as he touched himself to relieve the pressure of how much he wanted her.

Draco hissed in surprise when Hermione's thighs suddenly gripped his ribs tighter and he felt her long sharp fingernails bite into the skin at the nape of his neck. She let out a whimpering sort of laugh that was mostly a moan, and Draco smirked as he realised what had just happened. He, Draco Malfoy, had just successfully given his girlfriend, Hermione Granger, her first orgasm. He felt like the cat that ate the canary as happiness flushed through him. Taking his hands out from beneath her skirt, Draco wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her forward. She still had her legs locked around him and she squeaked in surprise as he tugged her down off the windowsill.

She clung to his chest shakily until Draco stepped closer to the wall, pressing her against it. When she unfurled her legs from around him and tried to stand, her legs quivered and Draco knew that if he hadn't had hold of her, she probably would've slipped down the wall to sit at his feet.

"What did you do to me?" Hermione breathed to him, staring into his twinkling eyes and realised that there was no more worrying about falling for Draco Malfoy. She'd already fallen and landed in a blissful world of clouds and happiness.

"Merlin, you're beautiful when you're flushed like that. You practically glow." Draco told her, smiling.

"You're amazing, Mi Corazon" Hermione whispered to him "Is it my turn now?" she added huskily. Draco just about came as she leaned in and buried her face in his neck, kissing a hot trail down his throat even as her fingers worked at his tie, loosening it so she could kiss along his collarbone because she knew it turned him on so much. As soon as she had, her hand trailed down his chest and Draco was seeing stars as she undid his belt with one hand, the other buried in his hair while her lips tormented his neck. He bit his lip and leant against the wall, trying to keep from reaching for his wand and vanishing both of their clothes.

**Hermione** smiled timidly against Draco's neck as he hissed when she managed to undo his belt and trousers before burying her hand inside, wrapping her small hand around his steel length. It wasn't the first time she'd felt his erection, but it was the first time Hermione had used her hands to touch him there. Closing her eyes, she tried to focus on everything she'd learned about doing this from her trashy novels.

He was warm and full in her hand and slowly Hermione let her hand glide up and down his length. He exhaled sharply and for a moment Hermione was worried she'd hurt him. But when one of his hands tipped her face up so that he could ravage her mouth with his lips and tongue, Hermione realised she must be doing something right. When he began to thrust into her hand as she ran it up and down, Hermione tightened her grip just a little bit and began to move her hand a little faster.

She could feel a little bit of stickiness around his tip and Hermione knew from her books that it meant he was getting close. Smirking, she pulled away from his demanding lips to burying her mouth against his throat. As she did it, Hermione began to pump her hand up and down faster, even as she drew his flesh into her mouth and suckled until she knew he would have a large purple love bite. Draco's head tipped back and Hermione could hear his fast breathing. He cursed softly as she stroked him, but the huskiness in his voice made her think it was a curse of pleasure rather than pain.

"Hermione" Draco breathed, and Hermione could hear his panic. She smirked, knowing he must be really close to cumming now, especially when he began to pump his hips quickly, increasing the speed and friction of her hand against his rod. He gasped and his knees buckled as he came. Hermione felt herself smile, pleased that she hadn't messed it up even as warm, sticky liquid shot into her hand, coating the skin of her palm. Draco shuddered against her as the last waves of his orgasm rolled through him. Hermione pressed her lips gently against his neck before slowly pulling her hand out of his pants.

Draco was still leaning against the wall with one hand, and still had the other buried in Hermione's hair when Hermione pulled out her wand and cleaned her hand and then him with a quick spell. When he opened his eyes, Hermione blushed, suddenly feeling shy and timid in spite of what they had just done.

"You're incredible" he whispered to her. Hermione blushed a brighter red. She didn't really know what to say. If they didn't start heading back to their friends that might be missed, but Hermione didn't want to just walk away without saying anything to him. Of course, she had to bite her tongue to keep from blurting out something crazy, like that she thought she might be in love with him. Suddenly, Hermione had an idea.

"Draco, are all of your friends going home for Christmas?" she asked him. Draco quirked an eyebrow at her.

"Yes. Why?"

"Well…. Were you serious when you said you didn't want to be away from me for Christmas?"

"Of course. I don't want to go home, but since you aren't going to be here and all my friends are going, I might as well go."

"I was just thinking…. Harry and Ron are going to the Burrow and you're friends all think you're going home. Mine think I'm going skiing. But I was thinking, what if you write to your parents and tell them you need to stay and study for the OWLs and I do the same?"

"But if you're friends think you're not going skiing anymore, they'll want you to go with them somewhere." Draco said, baffled by where she was going with this.

"But we won't tell them. My parents never meet me at Kings Cross, so I'll pretend that I'm just going to catch the tube to my part of London like usual, and go home. My parents won't be there because they will go skiing without me. If you were to take the Knight Bus into London, I could meet you somewhere and we can take the train to my house, which would be conveniently empty over Christmas." Hermione smiled.

"Why wouldn't we both just stay at school?"

"Because our friends will intervene if we try to stay at Hogwarts. Besides, at my house I'd get you all to myself." Hermione smiled up at him and she wondered if Draco's thoughts jumped instantly to all the things they might do with no one around to interrupt them or to look at them strangely for being together. Draco slowly started to smirk at her, and Hermione blushed at the heat in his gaze.

"Are you sure you want to be all alone with no one around to save you from me, Granger?" he asked her sinisterly, pulling out the sneering, fierce expression she'd seen him use on a snotty first year last night who'd given him lip. Hermione chuckled huskily.

"The real question Draco Malfoy, is whether you want to be stuck with me? You might find that I'm a very different girl when I don't have a goody-two-shoes, know-it-all reputation to maintain for the public eye."

"You really want to spend your entire Christmas with just me? There'll be no parents or friends or anyone else around to make sure I don't have my wicked way with you. For two whole weeks." Draco asked her seriously.

Hermione could see his hesitation and wondered what caused it. Was he as nervous as she was about what they might get up two for two weeks running around in London, staying at her family home with no one there to supervise them? Because Hermione certainly was. She was worried she might do something foolish like jump his bones the way she wanted to, or blurt out just how much she fancied him like she almost had when he'd made her orgasm.

"Draco, what makes you think I'm not suggesting this specifically because there'll be no supervision or interruptions to keep me from having _my_ wicked way with _you_?" Hermione asked him, in spite of the nervous trill in her veins. In the darkness of the restricted section of the library, Hermione watched the deliciously sinful smirk spread across Draco Malfoy's face.

"Everyone's wrong about you, Hermione Granger. You are most certainly a complete genius, but underneath that goody-two-shoes exterior lurks a wanton vixen enslaved to depravity." He smirked as he leant closer tipping her face so he could kiss her. He smiled when he stopped to add "How did I ever get this lucky?"

* * *

**A/N: Had you all fooled that chapter 5 might be the last chapter didn't I? Haha, nope. I have plenty more to come on this story. Many thanks for all the sweet reviews. I hope you love this chapter, and that you are excited for the smut of the next one. Pretty please leave me a review. Much Love xx-Kitten.**


	7. Mugwort

**Mugwort**

Hermione glanced sideways as she stepped of the Hogwarts Express at King's Cross station. Dumbledore had told her all about Harry's vision dream and about Mr Weasley, and Hermione felt bad about it, but as Draco had pointed out, there wasn't really anything she could do to help them all and she knew it was selfish, but she didn't want to give up on the idea of spending two weeks with Draco and no one else. She'd barely slept last night because she'd been so excited about all the things they could do together for the two weeks.

The blonde boy caught her eye and winked as he made his way across the platform and disappeared through the barrier between the magical and muggle worlds. Since Hermione's friends weren't here, she didn't need to lie to anyone, but Draco still had his friends to contend with. Hermione and Draco had agreed that he would go first and would take the Knight Bus into Trafalgar Square. Hermione would get there via tube, meeting him at the train station entrance. From there they would both take the tube to her parents house, which was empty since they had owled Hermione yesterday to tell her they were going skiing without her and would buy her a souvenir.

She felt bad about lying to them too, but as Hermione dragged her trunk and Crookshanks' cage through the barrier and all the way to the underground, she couldn't control the thrills of excitement at doing something so reckless and breaking so many rules. No one noticed Hermione as she took the tube to Trafalgar Square, and as she dragged her trunk up to the entrance, Hermione started to smile.

The short winter days meant that even though it was only five in the afternoon, it was almost dark out, but that didn't keep Hermione from spotting him. Sitting on his own trunk, looking the picture of ease and refinement, Draco Malfoy waited for her at the entrance to the station. Draco leaned his back against the wall and had his long legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. Hermione giggled again at the sight of him trying to dress like a muggle, since the only thing he had was a suit. It was black, with a grey shirt and it brought into focus his pointed face, platinum hair and pale complexion. The grey of his shirt complimented the silver of his eyes. Hermione rolled her eyes at his pose of complete ease. He was right by the entrance to the underground as he sat on his trunk, and Hermione noticed a few people eyeing him, clearly trying to work out what he was doing because he looked as rich as he was, yet he sat on his trunk like beggar.

"Fancy seeing you here, Malfoy." Hermione smiled as she walked towards her blonde boyfriend. "You do know that people are trying to work out whether youre rich or in need of a handout right?"

"Why would they be doing that?" Draco asked, glaring at a pair of Muggle men as they went by.

"Because you're sitting somewhere so public. Usually beggars try to sit in people's way to get themselves noticed. But you look too rich and scary for them to take pity on you." Hermione told him.

"I got funny looks on the bus too" Draco told her. "I hope those idiots don't tell anyone they dropped Draco Malfoy into Trafalgar Square. If it gets back to my parents that I was in London instead of school, I'm done for."

"Even if they do, you can tell your parents it wasn't you. Besides, I live nowhere near Trafalgar Square so even if someone did see you, they won't assume a connection." Hermione smiled "Come on, Mi Corazon. We have a twenty minute train ride from here to my house." Hermione held out her hand and smiled when Draco stood up and took hold of it. It felt incredible to hold his hand in public.

Hermione led him down into the underground, realising that even though it was Saturday, trying to brave the underground a little after five in the evening had been a bad idea. Draco almost got lost, and swore at several muggles who accidently bumped into Hermione, almost causing her to trip. They missed the first train to her house because Hermione didn't feel confident that if she and Draco ran for it, they would both make it. And she cold just imagine the havoc of Draco Malfoy getting lost in the underground system in the heart of London.

"Draco, if we get separated at any point, like you end up on the train and I don't. Make sure you get off at the next stop ok?" Hermione told him, clutching his hand tightly as the sea of muggles swarmed on and off the trains

"This is madness." Draco growled, still angry about the muggles who had bumped into Hermione. Hermione giggled at him. He kept glaring at people, trying to use his regular tactics to keep people out of his personal space, but the muggles of London didn't give a hoot about Draco Malfoy's personal space bubble. They cared about catching their train so they could get home on time.

"This is the underground." Hermione told him as she led him onto the train. People crowded on and since they had such a long train ride, Draco and Hermione managed to get themselves into a corner where they could push their trunks up against the wall and not have anyone falling over them. Once he got into a corner Draco sat back down on his trunk, this time on the end instead of the top, and as soon as he did he pulled Hermione down onto his lap, wrapping his arms around her stomach so he couldn't lose her in the crowd and couldn't have anyone else but her in his personal space for a moment.

"Are you alright?" Hermione murmured to him as he pressed his face into her back and sighed. She felt him nod and patted his hand comfortingly. It felt wonderful to sit on his lap, even if he was tense and on edge. It was just so different from how they had to act at Hogwarts. Here in the heart of muggle London, it didn't matter if anyone looked at them and thought they were a couple. Hermione even noticed a woman a few years older than herself smiling at them fondly as she rested her head against the chest of her own boyfriend. Hermione smiled back happily, feeling as though she could connect with the world from just that shared smile.

As they got closer and closer to Hermione's house, she started to fidget. She was nervous now. After all, while her parent's house was nice, and Hermione absolutely adored it, it would be practically a broom cupboard compared to what Draco was used to. Not to mention the fact that the sexual tension was building between them with every step they took closer. She could feel it sizzling in the air between them, making her want to stop and turn so she could kiss him there in the street.

"Are we almost there?" Draco complained, still unsettled from the crowded underground. They'd only gotten off the train a minute ago, and already he was complaining about the walk from the station to her house, even though it was thoroughly deserted of any and all movement. She lived on a quiet street in a quiet suburb of London, where she didn't have to worry about nosey neighbours or being attacked as she walked home in the dark. Hermione liked it here, and she was excited and anxious about sharing this side of her life with Draco. After all, he was her boyfriend. But he was also a pureblood wizard who came from a family prejudiced against anything and everything muggle. Her house ran on electricity, her parents owned a tele and they most definitely did not have a house elf to do everything for them. Hermione was worried he was going to look at her and think she was crazy for liking this side of her life just as much as the magical side.

"Yes, that's it just up there." Hermione pointed to her home, two doors down. "I probably should've warned you, compared to what you're used to, my house will seem tiny…. It's decent by muggle sizes, but compared to a Manor, I suspect it will seem like a broom cupboard."

Draco just smiled at her. "You mean that where you live you can't go for days without seeing another person?" Draco asked her sardonically "Trust me Hermione, having a huge house might be portrayed to muggles as meaning you're happy because you have everything. But if I wanted to, I could get lost in my own home, I could probably elude my whole family for years."

Hermione looked sideways at him and saw him frowning slightly. He looked handsome in the street light as Hermione opened the gate into her front yard.

As she led him up the path and stopped to unlock the front door, Hermione felt herself gulp, excitement and anticipation mingling with nervousness. She couldn't believe she was actually doing this. She was about to let Draco Malfoy into her house. And he was going to spend the two weeks of Christmas break with her. Hermione felt terrified by the idea. There would be no one to keep her from doing anything foolish, no time limit on being together. There would be no one to catch them if they enacted some of the things they'd been reading in the trashy novels they shared, no one to talk Hermione out of surrendering her virginity to Draco Malfoy.

A part of her knew that these holidays, she was going to have sex for the first time. She knew it from the way Draco's grey eyes had held a carnal promise every time he looked at her all year. Every time they snogged at school, Hermione knew that both of them wanted more and this Christmas there would be nothing to stop either of them from giving each other everything. The thought scared Hermione, but it excited her too. She wanted to give Draco everything; wanted him to be her first everything. Hermione tried to ignore the niggling little voice in the very back of her mind that hissed about how nice it would be if Draco were her last everything too.

As she let the front door creak open, Hermione stepped inside and turned on the lights before she moved her trunk aside to let Draco in. He looked around interestedly, taking in everything from the boring green carpet to the pale purple walls and the hundred of picture frames that lined Hermione hallway. Hermione gulped nervously as she closed the door behind her, a very small part of her felt like she was cutting off her own escape, sealing her fate to have sex with him sometime over the next two weeks. There was no going back from here, a voice in her head told her, from here on out she would be a different girl. She wouldn't just be the girl who secretly dated her best friends' rival; she'd be the girl who slept with her tormenter. The voice whispered nervously about what Harry and Ron would say if they knew. Another voice pushed that one out though, as it insisted that this would be the perfect time for Hermione to jump Draco and have her way with him.

They both hung up their coats on the hooks inside the door and then eyed each other nervously. Hermione wondered if Draco's thoughts were travelling the same path as hers. From here on out he would be the boy who defied everything he was supposed to believe in, to be with the one girl he wasn't supposed to want.

"So…. This is your house." Draco said finally. Hermione blushed when she realised they'd been standing there eyeing each other for several minutes

"Oh… um….yes…. Let's go this way. We can put our trunks in the lounge and I'll let Crookshanks out. Then I'll show you around." Hermione stammered out as she tried to control her pounding heart.

* * *

**Draco** could tell Hermione was nervous. She kept chewing her bottom lip and it was driving him crazy. Her house was quaint, filled with warm colours and all the touches that made it a home. He liked the shoe rack by the door, and the coat stand in the corner. There were pictures on the walls as she led him down the hallway and Draco stopped to smirk at one of a little girl who could only be Hermione with her face covered in chocolate cake and her wild hair in pigtails. There were many more and Draco found himself smiling affectionately as he looked into a picture of a little girl no more than five or six years old, riding on the shoulders of a man who had to be her father. She had a floating balloon tied around her wrist and she clung to her father's chin, her arms wrapped tightly around his head in terror. He could see now that she'd apparently had a fear of heights all her life.

More pictures revealed a bushy haired Hermione missing her front teeth, wearing school uniforms, playing a piano with her feet swinging far above the ground. The further down the hall she led him, the more recent the picture became, ending with one of her that had to have been during the summer. Hermione was lying in a lawn chair wearing a floral print sundress. She had a glass of something on a table next to her and a book on her lap. She waved at whoever had taken the picture, and smiled beautifully. As Draco stared at the picture he realised she was right. There was a whole set of facets to Hermione's life that he knew nothing about and hadn't even though might exist.

"Cute Granger." He murmured when he realised Hermione was standing there mortified while he perused her family photographs. She was blushing a pretty pink beside him.

"Why do I suddenly feel like this was a bad idea?" Hermione asked him even as she opened her cat cage and loosed the pug-faced ball of orange fur inside."Bringing you here" she added when he tilted his head uncertainly.

"Because you think I'm going to make fun of you for all kinds of things about your life. Like how cute you looked as a little kid eating cake." Draco smiled at his blushing girlfriend. "I'm sorry for being such a prat. It never occurred to me how different your life might be from mine. Outside of Hogwarts, everything for me is practically the same, just a little more formal and much colder. But your life…. Your life is warm, your house feels like real home. It feels like people who love each other live here together. And your parents love you so much that they plaster their walls with unmoving pictures of you so that you're always in their thoughts whenever they leave the house." Draco shook his head slowly "I could never make fun of you for that Hermione. In my house we have life sized portraits painted, but any other photographs are all stuck in albums on bookshelves."

Hermione smiled at him uncertainly. She really had no idea how different their lives were. Draco could see she was still nervous though, nervous to have him there in her parents' house, someone she wasn't supposed to have fallen for, yet couldn't keep away from. He wondered if she was as excited about the idea of just the two of them spending time together as he was, or if she knew how amazing it had felt when he'd been allowed to swear at those muggle men who'd run into her. His own friends had a habit of running into Hermione, often knocking her bag or her to the floor, leaving a mess for her to try and pick up if her bag split open. Draco hated them for it, because every time they did he had to laugh and sneer along with them before leaving her there to pick it up by herself. He hated doing that. It went against everything his mother had taught him about how to treat a lady, especially how to treat one you cared for.

"You know, it's probably not helping you feel comfortable with me being here when you're so nervous you'd be dropping things if you held onto anything Hermione. What's the matter? Don't you trust me? Don't you feel safe having me here?"

Hermione bit her lip again while she blushed and Draco had to fight himself to keep from swooping towards her and claiming her lips in a sound snog. The air between them was thick with her perfume and the sexual tension that just kept building between them. He wanted to do wicked things to her. He wanted to strip her naked there in the hallway and make love to her on the hallway carpet. He wanted to shag her against the wall so hard that all of the pictures fell down around them. He wanted to crush her to him and ravish her mouth until they couldn't breathe.

"I think it's that I don't trust myself with you." Hermione murmured "I don't trust myself to behave when I have little voices in my head whispering about what a good idea it might be if I were to jump your bones right now."

Draco felt a little thrill to know that he was affecting her so, because she was definitely affecting him. He'd been sporting a boner since he'd pulled her into his lap on the train, every step walking here had been painful and it was just getting worse as he watched her gnaw on her lip.

"That makes two of us" Draco told her sinisterly "I'm not sure I trust myself with you at all. Not with all the things I'd like to do to you floating around in my head every time you bite your lip." Draco took a deep breath, ignoring the beast roaring in his chest as he gallantly offered "Do you want me to go Hermione?"

Hermione's head snapped up in surprise a protest ready on her lips "What? No. Why would you say that? I want you to be here. Of course I want you to be here. I don't want you to go." she blurted in a rush of nervousness to him.

"Mon Amour, you're trembling…. Do I make you so nervous?" He said softly.

Draco watched her blush again "No, I'm not nervous at all, and I'm not trembling. I don't want you to go anywhere. I want you to stay with me." She squared her shoulders and he could see her push her nervousness down even though she lied. She was still trembling. "Now, come along so I can show you around otherwise you might get lost."

Draco chuckled at the idea. He lived in a Manor and he'd never been lost. He didn't really think her house would bring him unstuck.

"Now, the bedrooms and bathroom are upstairs. Down here we have the dining room, lounge, laundry room and kitchen." Hermione said, suddenly businesslike as she tried to get control of herself. Draco smirked to hear it and decided to make things difficult for her. As if the sexual tension wasn't bad enough, but he couldn't resist.

"Where am I sleeping?" He asked her huskily. He hadn't been able to concentrate since she'd suggested they do this little trip together, mostly because of how incredible it had felt to have her hand wrapped around his todger so exquisitely and expertly in the library two nights ago. He hadn't been able to forget the look of pleasure on her face as he'd given her an orgasm, and the sound she'd made had haunted his dreams. To be here in her house with her all alone and no one to ever interrupt them…. It was more than he could take.

Hermione froze as he asked her that and Draco tried to arrange his face to look like he was politely interested, rather than dying to hear he say that he'd be sleeping with her.

"Erm….. Well, I didn't really think about that…. we don't have a guest bedroom" Hermione said, her cheeks pink. So… I guess you have options. You'll either be sleeping in my bed… with me…. Or you can have mine and I'll sleep in my parents room."

"So either way, it would make sense for me to put my trunk in your room?" He asked her innocently. He was trying to lure her into her own bedroom but Draco didn't even care. All he could think about was the way the muggle jeans she wore hugged her every curve, the way she looked so beautiful when her lips were swollen from his kisses, and that sound she'd made when he'd brought her off… he wanted to hear her make it again and again until they both passed out from sheer exhaustion.

"Um… I suppose that would make sense" Hermione said nervously, obviously noticing the heat in his gaze as he let his eyes ravage her body hungrily. Draco could all but hear her frantic heartbeat as she led him upstairs. She stopped in front of a white bedroom door with her name on it and Draco's hands started to itch.

"Promise me you won't laugh at my room?" Hermione said, turning to him. Draco smiled, standing less than a meter from her.

"I promise I won't laugh." He murmured huskily, watching the way she bit her lip and the way her chest rose and fell as her breathing sped up. Her perfume was permeating his brain, stealing away his rationality and Draco felt like a man possessed as he stepped forwards to capture her lips in the hungriest kissed he'd ever given her. He couldn't take anymore of seeing her bite it without going insane from lust. Not when she smelled so bloody fantastic and looked so beautiful.

Hermione let out a little whimpering moan as her hands came up to delve into his hair while he pressed her against her bedroom door. Her mouth opened obligingly beneath his and her tongue swept out to meet his with as much passion and hunger as he felt. Draco sighed contentedly. This was his Hermione. This was the girl he knew, not the nervous worried girl she'd been all afternoon, but the fierce, passionate girl who had it just as bad for him as he had it for her. The sweet taste of strawberries lingered in her mouth and he couldn't get enough of it. Her lips were firm and hungry against his and Draco groaned when she rocked her hips against his sinfully.

The little vixen was going to be the death of him if she kept that up. He was already seeing stars and if she kept on doing that he was going to end up buried deep inside her as she groaned his name until she forgot her own. Draco stumbled forwards when the door he had her pressed against suddenly opened inwards, but he never broke his kiss as she began to walk backwards into her room.

* * *

**Hermione**'s heart raced in her chest and desire pooled between her legs as she snogged Draco Malfoy senseless. All her nervousness had been forgotten the minute he'd kissed her, and as she back-stepped across her room while she kissed him, Hermione could only think about how much she wanted him. When her legs collided with the edge of her bed Hermione gasped. Draco kept walking, toppling her backwards onto her bed and landing lightly on top of her.

Hermione groaned as she felt his pelvis align with hers. Her hands tightened in his hair, pulling him closer as she snogged him harder. She wanted him so badly that the spot he had tormented between her legs two days ago was throbbing and pulsing with need. She could feel that her knickers were damp with excitement and pressing deliciously against that region she could feel his hardness.

She swallowed Draco's groan as she rolled them both over so she could straddle him. His fingers dug into her hips for a moment before he snagged hold of her shirt and Hermione lifted her arm as Draco stripped it off her. Hermione let her own fingers work at his buttons, undoing them even as she got goose bumps from the way his warm hands travelled down her neck and chest until they cupped her breasts. She still wore a bra, but as Hermione freed Draco of his shirt, he rolled her nipples between his thumb and forefingers. Her back arched as desire stabbed through her, making her want him even more.

Hermione's centre was placed directly over the hard lump in Draco's trousers and she rubbed herself against him in time with his finger as the rolled her sensitive nipples. Hermione whimpered when one of his hands deserted her flesh, and gasped when he unhooked her bra. He slid it down her arms and stole it, tossing it aside before he stopped to stare at Hermione's bare breasts. Hermione blushed as she looked down at her own rosy nipples and modest breasts. To her they were normal, nothing special or fascinating, but as Draco stared at her Hermione suddenly felt different about them.

He stared as though she was a goddess of womanhood and Hermione could see his feelings for her shining in his lustful gray eyes. She squeaked in surprise when he flipped them over again and Hermione moaned when Draco took one of her taut nipples between his lips, flicking the sensitive peak with his tongue before drawing her breast into his mouth. She'd never felt anything like it. Heat rushed through her body and her back arched up off the bed, wanting to feel more of him. She felt the rush of excitement between her legs a moment before warm liquid coated her nether lips. Yearning pooled in the warm secretive spot beneath her abdomen, and Hermione felt her hips buck against him as his tormented her nipple with his tongue. His hand administered the same torture to the other nipple, making sure it wasn't neglected and Hermione dug her nails into his shoulder at the waves of pleasure roiling inside her.

"Draco… that feels amazing" Hermione gasped, her head thrashing back and forth as the pleasure he was giving her threatened to consume her. When he hummed happily while he had her nipple pressed against the ribbed roof of his mouth, Hermione's eyes crossed. She bucked her hips against him again and Draco chuckled without releasing her. The vibrations of his laughter through his tongue pushed Hermione over the edge and she cried out as something inside her snapped like a rubber band pulled too tight. Something twitched and pulsed between her legs as fire sizzled through her blood.

* * *

**Draco** released the nipple he'd been tormenting when her body relaxed beneath his, moving across to lavish the other one with attention. The sound she'd made when she cried out as her orgasm overtook her senses had his todger twitching to be buried inside her, but Draco didn't want to rush her. No matter how much he wanted to strip them both of all clothing and thrust himself home inside of her, he knew he'd have to convince her first.

Her nails dug into his flesh, piercing the skin as she urged him on and Draco smirked against her breast. He loved it when she marked him. He still wore the purple love bite she'd given him two days ago, as well as the eight little crescent shaped scabs at the back of his neck where her nails had pierced his skin in her pleasure. Hermione probably wasn't aware of the magic surrounding such a marking, but Draco was and his heart sang to feel her do it again. Within the magical world, there was a ritual within a marriage ceremony that called for a husband to mark him new wife as his. Most couples had phased it out as barbaric, because families like his tended to mark each other with a scar or a tattoo. Tattooes were still common, but his family was big on scars. His mother had Lucius's initial branded into her thigh, and his father had Narcissa's name carved into his flesh with a dagger so deep that it scarred for life, directly over his heart.

Draco knew it was barbaric, but when they had done those things to each other his parents had been very much in love. They were one of the few pureblood betrothals that had gotten over their irritation at such a match when they'd met and had been in love by the time his mother had finished school. The tradition meant something to Draco and he liked it every time Hermione left a mark on him.

Every time Hermione marked his flesh, she was claiming him as hers. Publicly announcing to the world that he was taken, that he was spoken for. And though he didn't have to if he chose, Draco would wear those little crescent shaped fingernail sized scars for the rest of his life. He'd even cursed the marks she'd left on him so they would be a permanent scar on the back of his neck. The idea of having her claim him that way made his groin ache heavily as he strained against his trousers. He wanted to mark her the same way, but knowing Hermione she would find it barbaric. It was another reason he'd given her the lucky star necklace. It marked her as his and for the rest of time she would look at it and know it meant she'd been with him once upon a time.

Hermione whimpered as Draco released her nipple pausing to lick it cheekily before her kissed his way down her soft stomach. He knelt next to her bed as he kissed the skin along her waist band, his hands toying with the fastening on her jeans. He smirked a little bit when she sank her hands into his hair and moaned softly instead of protesting.

The rasp of the zipper sounded loud in her quiet room as he undid her jeans, and Hermione must have thought so too because as Draco slid his hand beneath her bottom and tugged on the waisted band of her jeans, she reached for something on her night stand. Soft classical music began playing form somewhere in the room, but Draco wasn't much interested in where the noise came from. Not when he could focus on the view of her jeans sliding down her legs while he got to trail his hands over her creamy skin. Her soft warm skin felt like silk as he pulled her pants off her ankles and began to run his hands back up her legs.

Her peaches and cream skin glowed in the light that came on when she clapped her hands together and Draco marvelled at her soft silkiness as his hands skimmed up her calves and over her knees. Hermione looked relaxed on the bed as he pressed a kiss to the inside of her right knee and then another a little higher than the first. He wondered what she was thinking about as he did this to her that had her smiling softly and looking completely at ease. He knew this was the first time she'd been naked with anyone, and yet she made no move to cover her body or try to hide her body from his hungry gaze. She bit her lip when he kissed the inside of hr thigh, running his ands lightly up and down, getting closer and closer to his goal.

Her nether peach, as she liked to call it, surprised him. Except for a thin vertical strip of dark hair at the top of her sex, her body bore absolutely no hair, showing off her pink skin. Draco could see the way her folds glistened as he kissed his way up her thighs and Hermione quivered in anticipations as he gently ran his fingers over her flesh. He was seeing stars at just the feel of his flesh against that part of hers, and Hermione gasped when he used his fingers to delicately spread the petals of her flower. Draco caught his breath in his throat as he peered at her. Her folds where pretty pink, soft to touch and slick with her arousal for him.

When Draco leaned in slowly and gently stroked his tongue along her slit, tasting her for the first time, Hermione let out a little squeal. Smirking Draco realised he'd surprised her. Before she could react he did it again, this time dipping the tip of his tongue inside her to taste the sweet nectar of her peach like she had challenged him to so many months ago. She tasted sweet and salty at the same time. Tangy. As Draco tried to work out exactly what the flavour was, he licked and suckled at her flesh, enjoying the soft sound of the whimpers and moan he elicited from her.

When her thighs began to tense up, Draco slowly slid one long finger inside her. Hermione arched off the bed at the feel of him penetrating her that way, and her eyes flew open to meet his. Draco smiled at her for a moment before drawing the little bud he'd found amidst her petals into his mouth lovingly. She looked beautiful, her cheeks pink with pleasure, her chest heaving with the feelings he was giving her, and her eyes sparkling with a lot more than lust. Gently he scraped his finger against the front wall within her, feeling the rough patch amidst silky, hot walls. Hermione wiggled, trying to free her bud from his onslaught as he tormented it with his tongue and very gently with his teeth, using the knowledge he'd picked up from her trashy novels to make her body sing beneath his touch.

He was gentle with his finger inside her, making sure not to hurt her as he plunged it deeply and hooked it to drag over her g-spot with each withdrawal. He could feel Hermione coming undone beneath him as he lapped at her flesh and when she arched her back lifting her hips in an attempt to keep his finger inside her, Draco smirked. As he plunged back inside, he added a finger even as he took her clit between his teeth and gently twisted it sideways.

Hermione came completely unwound. Her hands balled up the fabric of her bedspread, her back arched as she threw her head back and let out one of those, moaning laughs in pleasure. Draco smirked against her flesh, suckling the rush of liquid from her flesh even as he took his hands from her body to unfasten his trousers. Hermione lay there panting and trying to wiggle away from his tongue as Draco's erection sprang free from his restrictive trousers and they slid to his ankles as he stood to kiss his way back up her body.

With one hand he aligned himself with the entrance to her lady garden, while the other slid into her hair and lifted her head so he could kiss her soundly on the lips. Gently he began to push himself into her but as he did Hermione's eyes flew open and her hands caught hold of his pulsing, heavy penis, stopping him before he could penetrate.

"What are you doing?" She gasped, breaking away from his kiss, startled.

Draco searched her face in confusion. Did she not want him?

* * *

**Hermione **caught sight of Draco's expression as his face clouded with confusion and a little hurt and she realised that he thought she didn't want him to have sex with her. She wanted to groan as he stared down at her, his cheeks turning pink as he blushed at the idea of her rejecting him.

"Draco…." Hermione murmured waiting for him to meet her eyes "We're not at Hogwarts… we can't use magic to prevent certain things from happening that tend to only occur when people do _that_."

He still looked utterly bewildered.

"Mi Corazon… it will become slightly difficult for you to walk away and pretend you hate me and have never been with me if I end up pregnant to you." Hermione explained, blushing crimson to be discussing such things when all she wanted to do was let him make love to her with his body the way he had with his hands and tongue.

The point seemed to click with him because Draco suddenly rolled off her.

"So we can't have sex here?" Draco asked her as he laid next to her on the bed and flung his arm over his eyes as though it would hide his own embarrassment. Hermione couldn't help but giggle when he gave a frustrated sigh.

"Of course we can. We just need something first. Since we're both underage, we can't use contraceptive spells outside of school. And I'm the only witch living in this part of London, so we'll get into trouble for Underage Wizardry if we use it." Hermione told him.

"Then how are we supposed to have sex?" He asked, still hiding his eyes from her. Hermione was distracted by the sight of his blood-filled groin. It looked much larger than it had felt when she had caressed him two days ago, and Hermione gulped at the idea of trying to get it to fit inside her.

"Erm…. Well since we don't have any food in the house, we might as well go out for dinner…. So I'll show you when we stop at a pharmacy." Hermione told him distractedly, knowing she would completely ruin his erection and his buzz if she tried to explain condoms to him right now.

Draco still had his arm over his eyes as Hermione slowly sat up. Hesitantly she reached out and trailed her fingers up the underside of his engorged penis. Draco twitched at the contact, but Hermione liked that he didn't sit up and look at her. She might have lost her nerve otherwise. Feeling incredibly shy and daring at the same time, Hermione recalled everything she'd read about pleasuring a man as she wrapped her palm around him.

His skin was smooth and incredibly soft, the flesh underneath burning with heat. Slowly Hermione ran he hand up and down the length of him, enjoying the silkiness of his skin as her palm glided along his silk-covered-steel rod. Draco gasped when her fingers brushed over the swollen purple head and Hermione seized her courage to hear it. As she let her hand glide back down, Hermione leant over and took his tip between her lips swirling her tongue around him as she let her lips glide down his length in the wake of her hand.

She watched Draco's arm lift off his face as his eyes flew open and he groaned when she forcibly relaxed the muscles in her throat so she could suck more of him into her mouth. His hands were buried in her hair as she dragged her mouth back up him until she could tongue the sensitive fold of skin on the underside of his head. She plunged her mouth and hand back down and Draco let out a strangled sort of moaning sound as Hermione's mouth and throat clamped tight around him because her gag- reflex was trying to kick in. slowly she withdrew him almost all the way, enjoying the salty flavour of him.

Hermione decided that she liked doing this. She liked the way he gasped every time she tried something new and the way little moans of pleasure escaped him. He was usually so refined, even when they were snogging, that to hear him completely let go like this turned Hermione on.

"Hermione…." Draco breathed urgently when Hermione had worked herself into a rhythm once she had her gag-reflex under control. Draco was breathing hard as waves of pleasure rolled through him from what Hermione was doing to him and Hermione felt herself smirk around his todger when his hands in her hair tightened. His hips began to thrust upwards, rising to meet her as she swallowed him. Her gag-reflex kicked in again when his hand in her hair pushed her head down a little while his hips pushed up and Hermione heard Draco's strangled expletive as her mouth and throat clamped closed around him while he had himself buried to the hilt inside her.

She felt him spasm against her tongue and the next moment Hermione felt hot jets of liquid squirt into her as Draco Malfoy ejaculated straight down her throat. Hermione's mouth and throat tightened at the feel, making Draco groan even more as he emptied himself inside her. He gasped as she began to cough around him while she let go of him. Hermione kept coughing as she spat him out, her eyes watering as she tried to control her gag-reflex and kept from vomiting.

"Merlin, I'm sorry Hermione. Are you ok? I didn't mean to." Draco fussed as he pulled his wonderful, coughing girlfriend onto his lap and rubbed her back. When she stopped coughing she buried her face against his neck.

"I'm sorry Hermione" Draco whispered to her, feeling bad for almost choking the most amazing person he'd ever met.

"Don't be sorry. It wasn't your fault. And I'm fine." Hermione whispered back to him, snuggle her face into his neck and breathing in the scent of his cologne.

She felt like she was floating in an ocean of bliss. Even though she'd just had a coughing fit and almost choked on semen, Hermione couldn't get over what she and Draco had just done or how amazing he'd made her feel. Sitting in his lap, Hermione felt incredibly safe and strangely loved as he wrapped his arms around her middle and ran his hands up and down her back.

"You're the most wonderful person I've ever met Hermione Granger" Draco whispered into her ear before he lifted her as though she weighed nothing and rolled them both onto their side, pulling her up the bed so that he could cuddle up behind her and spoon her.

Hermione smiled when he pulled the knitted blanket her grandmother had given her up to cover the both of them. Draco cuddled up behind her, pulling her back until she fit just right against him. As she lay there naked in the arms of Draco Malfoy, Hermione felt completely content and felt her heart give another one of those melting kind of squeezes and she knew that by the end of their two weeks she would probably be completely, utterly and irrevocably in love with the blonde haired boy she was suppose to despise.

Her friends would throw a fit if they knew she was lying there in her house with Draco, instead of off skiing with her parents or hanging out with them. They would disown her to know she'd not only kissed him, but that she had just shared oral sex with him. But as Draco snaked his arm beneath her head and caught her hand to lace his fingers with hers, Hermione couldn't find it within herself to give a hoot about what her friends would've thought. Instead she thought about how happy she felt every time she spent time with her boyfriend, how special he made her feel when he was being sweet or cute, how much he made her laugh when he indignantly told her he wasn't cute, making himself all the cuter for being so cutely indignant.

"Draco?" she whispered to the boys she was almost certain she was in love with.

"Hmm?" he hummed sleepily.

Hermione smiled "I'm really glad you kissed me last Christmas."

* * *

**A/N: Hey guys. Thanks to everyone for reading and especially for reviewing. I'm going to do a few chapters about their Christmas together. I'll try to update my other fanfics too. Hope you enjoyed the chapter. Please review. Much Love xx-Kitten.**


	8. Arum

**_Warning:_** Chapter contains scenes of a sexual nature and scenes depicting self harm.**  
**

**Arum**

Hermione and Draco had been at her house for two days and Hermione couldn't believe that they still hadn't had sex. As she stood in her family kitchen stirring a pot of stew that had been simmering all day, Hermione glanced at Draco out the corner of her eye. His white blonde hair hung down his forehead and into his eyes, while he focused on operating Hermione's toaster without burning the bread. He'd already burnt two pieces, and he was trying to keep from making it three for three.

Hermione couldn't help but admire her boyfriend. She taken him muggle clothes shopping yesterday for something a little less formal than a suit and found that shopping with Draco Malfoy was practically impossible. He was a fussy, spoiled little snot. Eventually Hermione had told him to stick his attitude somewhere unpleasant and dragged him into a thrift shop. They'd come out two overflowing bags later with all kinds of things a fifteen year old Muggle boy would wear. As she watched him now, he wore fleecy track pants because they had spent the entire day curled up on the couch. Draco had fallen in love with the workings of muggle television and every video Hermione slid into their VHS was a hit with him. She'd been forcing him to watch muggle Disney children's film with her all day, educating him in the ways of muggle love and muggle representations of witches and wizards like them.

Hermione bit her lip and tried to focus on the stew she was stirring, but it was incredibly difficult to do that with an extremely fit Draco Malfoy standing less than a meter away from her wearing nothing but grey track pants. He wore them low on his hips exposing every muscle of his hard, lissom torso to her hungry gaze and it was driving Hermione mad. So mad in fact that she was the reason he'd already burned two pieces of toast, because she kept reaching out to run her fingers across his silky skin, feeling the steel beneath. Every time she did it he'd grin at her knowingly and grab her before she could swat him away. Then he'd snog her senseless until the smoke detectors started beeping in anger at their neglect of the toast.

For the last two nights Hermione had snuggled down to sleep with Draco Malfoy naked in her bed right beside her and Hermione would be lying if she said she didn't like it. Yesterday Hermione had showed Draco around muggle London, but today he had insisted that he was not under any circumstance going near the underground since it was Christmas Eve and there would be people everywhere doing the last of their Christmas shopping. So instead Hermione had dragged him a few blocks down the street to a convenience store to buy ingredients to make stew and told him they could stay in all afternoon as long as he helped her cook dinner.

"Don't look at me like that Hermione" Draco warned her "Or I'm making you walk down the street to buy more bread all by yourself when we burn the whole loaf because you can't keep your hands to yourself."

Hermione giggled as he reprimanded her and when he gently swatted the hand she extended towards him. "What's the matter Draco?" Hermione giggled "Do I make you nervous?"

Draco's grey eyes glittered as she threw his words back at him from the other day.

"No. You just cause _this_ problem whenever I so much as catch a whiff of your perfume." Draco told her self-deprecatingly as he gestured to the erection he sported beneath the fabric of his pants.

Hermione giggled and bit her lip some more as she tried to keep from touching him long enough to let him cook the toast so that they could eat dinner. She had no idea how they hadn't had sex yet. Neither of them could keep their hands to themselves for more than a minute, but as of yet sex still loomed over them. Part of her suspected that they were both a little worried that when they actually did have sex, they would be as bad with that as they were with everything else and would spend the rest of Christmas break tangled between the sheets as they learned each other's bodies better than they knew their own.

Hermione had even taken Draco out for take-out Chinese food on his first night here, and on their way back they had stopped at the pharmacy. Draco had been baffled by the idea of condoms and accused them of being evidence of depravity. He'd also blamed condoms for the fact that muggle divorce was on the rise. When Hermione had questioned him on it he pointed out that if condoms helped muggles prevent pregnancy and disease, they made it easier for spouses to cheat on each other. Hermione had told him that the same thing could happen with wizards since they had a charm that did the same thing. Draco had proved her wrong however, when he pointed out that when a witch and wizard married in the wizarding world, the magic involved in the binding ceremony prevented the married couple from cheating on each other. Hermione had been intrigued to learn that there was a charm included in the ceremony that caused the married couple to be sexually repulsed by anyone who wasn't their spouse, unless one of them were to die. Hermione had pointed out that such a charm just caused people to want to kill their spouse to be able to shag someone else, but Draco had disproved that too by telling her that most couples had no idea about the charm, so it strengthened the marriage because they were always repulsed by anyone who wasn't their spouse.

Hermione idly wondered if the use of condoms was the problem keeping her and Draco from having sex. After all, she'd learned about condoms at school and from her parents before she went off the Hogwarts, but Draco had never heard of them and had seemed mildly disgusted by the idea of slipping a latex covering over his penis before he could put it inside her. They were useful of course, but Hermione supposed they were a little disturbing.

She'd also heard him mention something about traditional couples in the wizarding world abstaining from sex in order to share the act of love with the one person they were supposed to love forever, but Hermione dismissed the idea. After all, it's not like she and Draco would have the opportunity to wait for marriage when their relationship already had an expiry date. Unless he was hinting that maybe they shouldn't have sex because she should save it for the boy she was going to marry instead of the boy who was going to break her heart when he broke up with her to fight a war neither of them wanted a part of. Hermione worried at her lip. A part of her was concerned about having sex, not just because she knew it would seal the deal, buying her a one-way ticket to heart-break courtesy of Draco Malfoy, but also because of the risk.

After all, condoms were only eighty percent effective and they didn't have magic here in order to properly insure against pregnancy. Hermione wasn't worried about disease since Draco had admitted to her that he was just as virginal as she was, but pregnancy would be an issue. Hermione was horrified at the very idea of telling her parents she was pregnant at sixteen, let alone trying to explain to her friends how it came to be that a mudblood like her was carrying the child of Draco Malfoy. Perhaps sex was a bad idea….

But even as Hermione had the thought, she started thinking about how sad it would be to have Draco break up with her for the war, only to learn that she was in love with him. Sex was a physical expression of love after all, and Hermione suspected she was in love with the charming blonde haired boy she was lucky enough to call her boyfriend. What if she didn't have sex with him and then regretted it for the rest of her life if one of them died in the war or she never got to see him again?

"What are you thinking about, Mon Amour?" Draco whispered in to her ear as he wrapped his arms around her waist. Hermione didn't even think before she told him the truth.

"Sex."

* * *

**Draco** raised his eyebrows in surprise to hear her admit such a thing. She said it absently as though her mind was still on her thoughts and she had automatically answered his question. He wasn't surprised to know she'd been thinking about it though. He couldn't _stop_ thinking about it. Every time he looked at her, he thought about it, wondering what it might be like and how he could suggest they maybe give it a try.

He'd been disturbed by the inventions muggles had for preventing pregnancy, and it had put him off a little, but as he looked at Hermione wearing his button up grey shirt and thick woollen socks that came to her knees with nothing else but knickers on, Draco had to admit he was getting over his aversion. She had plaited her wild hair in two identical plaits that hung either side of her face, framing her beauty perfectly and Draco had never been so turned on in his life. As he cuddled her against him, he whispered into her ear

"Would you like to try it Mon Amour?"

Hermione tensed a little in his arms. When she spoke it amazed him all over again that she had such courage in the face of her fears.

"I think so…. But I'm nervous…. I read that it hurts for girls the first time and I'm a little terrified of getting pregnant since I want to at least finish Hogwarts before I even think about kids…. But I don't want to not do it, since I know I'd regret abstaining if I go off and get killed in the war….. Would you like to try it with me anyway, even though we have to use condoms?" Hermione spoke softly, leaning back against him trustingly. He liked the way she openly admitted her fears and thoughts to him, just like he adored the way she trusted him enough not to make fun of her for anything she said. He especially liked the way she'd grown so comfortable with him over the last few days that she was able to lean against him like this so unquestioningly. The last two days had him thinking that he never wanted to go home, or even back to Hogwarts. He wanted to just stay here with his girl forever.

Draco wondered how he had managed to fall in love with the most wonderful girl in the entire world and suddenly found himself floored. He was in love with her! He hadn't realised it until just now as he'd had the thought, but as he let that thought form in his mind he felt something inside himself click into place. He was in love.

Draco Malfoy was in love with a wonderful, beautiful, sexy, funny, utterly adorable, fierce, passionate, bossy young woman, and by some miracle she fancied him back enough that she'd gone against her better judgement and forgiven him for the cruel things he'd done to her in the past. She'd agreed to be his girlfriend and she'd saved him from a miserable Christmas spent listening to idiots talk bollocks about things he no longer believed in. A part of Draco wanted to sit down and cry as he had that thought.

He was in love with the one girl he couldn't have. Even if the good side won the coming war, Draco couldn't just keep Hermione. To protect his idiot family members and his own life, as well as hers, he'd have to break up with her and walk away from her, breaking both of their hearts in the process. And when he did, he would have to commit evil crimes to keep everyone he loved alive. Evil crimes that the one person he truly gave a hoot about, would never be able to forgive him for.

It would make him selfish to keep being with her, giving her the opportunity to fall in love with someone she would end up hating, but Draco didn't know if he could find it in himself to walk away from her before he absolutely had to. It would be cruel to have her fall for him like he had done for her and Draco realised suddenly that she'd been right the night she agreed to be his… They were both just setting themselves up for a broken heart.

"Draco?" Hermione asked sounding uncertain now because he'd been silent so long. Draco remembered that the girl he loved had just asked him if he'd have sex with her.

"Hermione…I…" He said, stepping back and letting go of her. He moved back until he was across the kitchen leaning against the far bench. He watched her turn towards him wearing his shirt and a bewildered expression. His heart squeezed at the sight of the diamond star glittering around her neck… Merlin he loved her!

"What's wrong Draco?" she asked, frowning in concern as she saw his agonized expression.

"I don't deserve you" he whispered to her, stricken.

"What? Draco why would you say that? You're wonderful." Hermione said, stepping towards him. Draco held up his hands to stop her, shaking his head as he watched her with wide eyes. How could she argue that when he was such a horrible bastard to her? When he'd hoped for her death in his second year? How could she say anything positive when he'd sweet-talked her into dating him just so he could turn around and break her trusting heart, because he was too much of a coward to tell his father and the Dark Lord to rot in hell for the rest of eternity? He was going to destroy her happiness, break her heart and eventually she would end up hating him for the things he would have to do in the coming war just to keep his own worthless arse out of the line of fire.

As Draco looked into her concerned brown eyes he felt like his heart was breaking. He couldn't do this to her. He couldn't stay with her long enough for her to go and fall in love with him too. He couldn't make love t her when he knew in his soul that she's one day curse his name and rue the day she'd ever laid eyes on him.

"I'm not, Hermione. I'm pathetic and I don't deserve someone like you…. You're so amazing Hermione, passionate and brilliant and brave. I'm none of those things. I'm just the idiot who wished on a star for something I thought didn't exist, only to find out it does and that I can't have it." Draco told her sadly.

"What do you mean? I don't understand Draco." Hermione said, her eyes searching his face for some explanation to his sudden mood change.

"Hermione, how can you ask me if I want to have sex with you? Why did you ask me to spend the holidays with you? Why did you even say yes to be my girlfriend? I treat you like crap. I let my 'friends' walk all over you and treat you as though you're lower than scum and when they're around, I have to do the same thing because I'm too much of a coward to stand up to my idiot father and tell him that everything he's ever taught me is all bollocks. I'm letting both of us get all tangled up in each other even though at the end of the day, I'm just going to have to walk away from you even when that's the last thing I ever want to do. And when I do, I'll be forced to do unspeakable things that you'll never forgive me for, all in the name of saving the life of people who are meaning less and less to me."

Draco pulled at his hair in frustration to keep from lashing out and breaking something. It would do no good to break anything of Hermione's because the thing he really wanted to break was himself. Himself and his parents for getting him into this mess. He wanted blood and he couldn't get it because hi stupid relatives had taught him that they were supposed to be more important to him than anything.

But how could they be when the most wonderful, brilliant, amazing, sweet, kind-heart, Good person he'd ever known was the girl staring at him with such concern? How could he think they should mean more to him when he was in love with the one girl they'd killing him for even speaking to, let alone loving? How could his parents mean anything to him when it was all their fault that he'd have to break the heart of the girl he loved? Bloody hell, how could he love them when it was all their fault his own heart was breaking like this?

"Where is all this coming from Mi Corazon?" Hermione whispered, her beautiful brown eyes filling with tears "Why are you saying these things?... Are you…. Draco are you trying to break up with me?"

Draco felt like she'd punched him in the stomach as a tear spilled out to trickle down her cheek.

"I… No!... Hermione I want to keep you. And I bloody well can't! It's not right for me to string you along like this when I'm still going to have to walk away from you… and if we have sex it's just going to be that much harder for both of us. I'll turn into a monster and all you'll ever feel when you look at me is revulsion that your let a coward like me touch you… I can't do that to you Hermione."

Another tear trickled down her cheek before Hermione wiped at it, eyes suddenly snapping angrily.

"Draco Malfoy, don't you dare!" she hissed suddenly. Draco stared at her, consumed by his own self loathing but wondering why she was suddenly angry at him.

"Don't you dare stand there and try to make excuses for yourself. If you want to walk away now, then be a man about it and tell the truth. I knew going into this that you'd walk away and break my heart, I even promised that when that happened I wouldn't try to stop you, but don't you dare stand there and make me cry by beating yourself up and doubting your entire life." Hermione stepped closer and poked him in the chest as she said the last don't you dare. She glared up into his face.

"We made a deal Malfoy" she said "We made a deal that this was a temporary situation, no matter how much we might not like it. You can't leave your family to die at the hands of Voldemort, and I can't desert my friends and do something barmy like run away with you. When the time comes you will do what you have to do to keep yourself and your family alive, just as I will do what I have to in order to keep my friends and family alive. We will go to war and someday I will have to stare at you across a battlefield and hope to my lucky stars that we both survive it and that my side wins. That's how it has to be, and that's the deal we made. But until that happens, we agreed we'd make memories of happiness and light and laughter so that if we should fall during our time on that battlefield, we could do so knowing we'd done something worthwhile in life. Even if it was only for a little while."

Hermione didn't give him a chance to speak before she threw her arms around his neck and pulled his face down, cutting off his words as she kissed him hard and angrily. She knotted her hands in his hair and when he tried to pull back from her, she gave it a sharp tug. Draco growled in irritation at his bossy little witch, clamping his arms around her waist and lifting her, spinning to sit her on the kitchen bench so he could snog her properly.

_Infuriating, sexy little know-it-all_ Draco growled inside his head as she wrapped her legs around him to pull him closer. She dragged her sharp talons down his back hard enough for it to hurt a little before dragging them right back up, then she buried them in his hair and used her grip on him to jerk his face back from hers.

"I don't know what's wrong with you that you think I'm just going to start hating you for the things you have to do to keep yourself alive, but you better get a clue Draco Malfoy. The only way I'm going to hate you is if you give up or give in and let yourself get killed before you can come back to me." Hermione told him. She glowered at him fiercely and it took Draco a moment to process what she had said.

"What are you saying Hermione? That if we go off to war and I have to kill people you're going to be able to just forgive me afterwards? That even if I've had to kill someone, you'll what? Take me back? Hermione I might have to kill people you know. People you love. Then what? You think you're going to be able to look at me the same? You think you won't hate having ever been with me? You really think you'd be able to forgive me for it and take me back?" Draco asked scathingly, trying to make sure she knew what she had signed up for when she'd agreed to be his girlfriend in the first place. There may come a day when he would be asked to look her best friend in the eyes and kill him. Not Potter obviously since the Dark Lord had a hard on for old Scar-head, but there might come a day in the war when Draco would have to kill the Weasel or the Weaslette or one of her other little friends. There was no way she would be able to forgive him for something like that.

She must be out of her mind. Everything she stood for was the sanctity of life. If he had to kill someone, she couldn't just forgive him. She wouldn't.

"I'm saying that I know you Draco. Better than anyone! You won't kill anybody and I think that deep down you know that. It's why you keep having these revelations about the fact that all the racist bollocks your family has taught you, is exactly that: bollocks! You don't have it in you to kill anybody. Not because you're too afraid, but because you know better. You know that life means something. Killing someone for such a stupid war isn't any more acceptable to you than it is to me. So I'm not worried that you'll go off and kill someone. You'll find another to keep yourself and your family alive rather than killing someone" Hermione told him matter-of-factly, spearing him with the truth he'd been burying in his heart "You've got to mean it Draco. When you use an Unforgiveable you've got to mean it, you've got to have the intent, the yearning to cause pain or take a life. And you'll never mean it. I've seen into your heart and soul and I know that you'll do some cruel things, some illegal things. But you won't kill or torture anyone. So when the time comes, you'll have to go off and do what you need to do and so will I. When someone wins the war, we'll deal with things from there. If it's my side, I'll testify about your change of heart before the war even began and hopefully keep you out of Azkaban and see how we can go about working something out together, and if your side wins… well if they do Harry will be dead and I might be too… but if I'm not I'll be looking for you and hoping that you still feel like you do now and we can run away together."

Something inside Draco broke as he heard her say that. Could she really mean it? She sat there on the kitchen bench in her family home wearing no pants, with her arms and legs wrapped around him. She wore his shirt and it was too big on her. Draco stared into the eyes of the witch he'd fallen in love with as he leaned his forehead against hers.

"Do you mean it?" Draco whispered softly. Hermione bit her lip.

"I'm not saying that I'll just be able to forgive you Draco. You're going to walk away and break my heart and there's this part of me that is screaming that I should never have gotten involved with you at all. There's another part screaming that you should defy your parents and be on my side, but if you do that you'll end up dead and break my heart anyway. You told me when we got together that we couldn't have forever and we probably can't…." Hermione gave him a soft smile "So I think we should make the most of our time together now, don't you?"

Draco Malfoy didn't know how he'd ever gotten lucky enough to be with Hermione, or how he'd been so unlucky that he wouldn't get to keep her, but as she leaned over and kissed him until he couldn't see straight, he decided she was right. He loved her now so he was bloody well going to make the most of loving her now.

* * *

**Hermione** was hot and bothered when she broke away from Draco's lips. She gasped when his hands tightened on her waist, trying to pull her back to him.

"Draco…." Hermione said breathlessly "I think we left the stove on."

That stopped him and Hermione unfurled her legs from around him when he tried to turn around to check it. She'd left it on a low setting, letting the stew simmer instead of boil.

"Do you want to eat now? We could finish the rest of our movie while we do." Hermione offered as she pushed him away from her, biting her lip at the feel of his bare chest again her hands.

"I want to devour you" he murmured huskily wrapping himself around her from behind and burying his face against her neck. Hermione's eyes crossed with lust. Whatever had caused his issues seemed to have been pushed to the back burner, because now he couldn't get enough of her. Hermione squirmed as she tried to focus on turning off the stove while his hand slipped down over her stomach and beneath the waist band of her knickers. Playfully his fingers tormented her flesh and Hermione groaned when he slid two long digits inside her while his thumb rubbed those wicked circles against her bud. Her hands gripped his forearms, trying to end her torment, but Draco just chuckled wickedly into her ear before nibbling on her earlobe.

Hermione didn't even know how they'd gotten up the stairs as Draco toppled her backwards on her bed. She also didn't know when he'd stripped his shirt off of her. All she knew was that his delicious weight was dropping down on top of her, pressing her into the mattress as his lips made love to hers. She wore nothing but her knickers and even as he kissed her, Draco was making short work of them. Hermione hissed in pleasure when he'd tugged them off her ankles and proceeded to drop his own pants while he was at it.

The sight of Draco Malfoy naked was one that Hermione would never forget. Every inch of him was long and tight with wiry muscles. The crisp hairs around his sex were the same platinum blonde as those on his head, and as Hermione stared up at him hungrily she smirked wickedly to see how their touching was affecting him. His manhood jutted high and proud, all the more noticeable because the purplish colour of the engorged appendage contrasted with the alabaster shade of the rest of his skin. Hermione bit her lip a she propped herself up on her elbows to stare at him. She could feel it in her bones that she was going to lose her virginity tonight and Hermione felt a rush of excitement and nervousness race through her veins. Her heart was pounding, carrying lust and fire through her veins, and when he looked at her from beneath his fringe as it hung in his silver eyes Hermione gave a little whimper in excitement. The warm oak scent of the cologne he wore permeated her sense and Hermione realised it was because the pillow beneath her smelled like him.

Draco watched her from the foot of the bed and Hermione could see the question in his eyes even as the ravaged her body. Hermione felt his hungry gaze like a caress against her skin and she felt the place between her legs grow damp as her stomach did a somersault in anticipation. Merlin she was really going to do it. She was going to make love to the boy she'd fallen so hard for.

"Mon Amour?" Draco whispered, the question clear on his face and in his eyes. Hermione bit her lip before she grinned at him wickedly. She was going to have sex with Draco Malfoy. Slowly, Hermione sat up, feeling nervous as she reached over to her nightstand, opening the draw and retrieving the box of condoms they had put in there two days ago. Draco watched her do it. Hermione had thought ahead and pulled off the plastic covering days ago so she didn't have to prolong their nervousness now. She opened the brightly coloured box and pulled out the strip of condoms. Tearing one off, Hermione glanced at Draco. He had slowly walked around the bed to sit next to her, his thigh brushed gently against hers and Hermione felt the butterflies in her tummy begin to revolt.

"Are you sure about this Hermione?" Draco murmured to her huskily. Hermione could see the evidence that he wanted her, but she could tell he was nervous about his too. "You won't be able to take it back afterwards" Draco whispered "Won't be able to someday give your innocence to your husband instead of the prick you went to school with…."

"Don't you want to?" Hermione whispered uncertainly, wondering why he would ask her these questions and tell her these things right now.

"I do…. I just don't want you to regret doing this with me" Draco murmured, reaching out to take her hand. He held it on her lap. "I don't want you to look at me sometime during our last two years of school and curse my name for shagging you and then having to break up with you. I don't think I could live with you hating me." His thumb drew circles against Hermione's skin.

"I don't think I could ever hate you again Draco. I want to do this with you…. If you want to?" Hermione told him as she laid her head on his shoulder. She smiled softly as the butterflies fluttered in her tummy.

"How do I use this thing?" Draco asked her quietly as he took the condom from her. Hermione giggled nervously.

"Would you like me to put it on you?" she whispered as she took it back from him and tore it open.

* * *

**Draco** watched her in fascination, breathing in sharply when her small hand wrapped around his todger and smoothed up and down it a few times. The feel of it had his blood pumping wildly, his pulse pounding in his head as he felt lust begin to take over him. When she had him standing at full attention, Hermione slowly rolled the slippery, rubbery tube like thing down over the head of his penis and then down his length. It felt strange, and when she brushed her hand down him again he couldn't quite feel the caress as much as he had without the condom.

"You know, it will just hurt you more if you're nervous" Draco whispered to his girlfriend when he noticed the way she fidgeted. Taking the lead, Draco crawled over so that they were in the middle of the bed and beckoned for her to join him. She was blushing as she moved over beside him and Draco smiled at her adoringly. She really had no idea how much he loved her. Sensing her nervousness as it grew, Draco leaned over and kissed her.

He took his time, exploring her sweet mouth, massaging her tongue with his until he felt her body relax. When he did, he crept closer to her, inching his weight over her as he began to caress her body with his hands. She moaned when he rolled her nipples between his fingers and arched into him a little. Draco smiled, focusing on his task. He'd been taught that when a girl lost her virginity it could be painful because their bodies needed to be 'opened'. Over the past two days Draco had felt the barrier within her when he pleasured her with his fingers and he'd been tempted to break it so that sex wouldn't be as painful for her. But he'd been taught how to do this so it wouldn't hurt as much; Draco knew that if he prepared her body for him, he could make it almost painless. And given how much he loved Hermione, he wanted to make sure he never hurt her.

Hermione kept tensing up every time Draco took things a little bit further, and she had three love bites by the time he finally let his fingers delve inside her lady garden. Slowly and methodically Draco wound Hermione's body tight, kissing her and caressing her and driving her wild with passion and lust until he felt her slick inner walls begin to tense around him. She cried out, making that sweet moaning laughing sound as her orgasm cascaded down around her and Draco made his move.

Before she had time to tense up and get nervous, even while she still rode the waves of ecstasy he'd unleashed within her, Draco aligned himself with her slick, blooming flower and slid inside her. Hermione's eye flew open but Draco pushed forwards, riding the last waves of her orgasm as he met with her maidenhead and forced his way through it with a hard thrust, opening her body. Hermione whimpered as Draco tore her hymen, but Draco swallowed the sound, capturing her lips and snogging her until she forget the brief moment of pain as her body relaxed into that blissful state that followed her orgasm.

As soon as he'd assured himself that she wasn't in pain and that he'd done the worst part in a way that made it so that he'd barely hurt her at all, Draco let himself feel. And when he did he almost came. The condom did nothing to prevent the feeling of heat and her tight passage clutched at him, stretching and rippling as Hermione's body tried to accommodate this new state. The feel of his todger completely encased in her tight heat made Draco groan. It was even better than he'd imagined it could be and he decided right then that he never wanted to stop shagging Hermione Granger.

The smell of her perfume was everywhere, coating his skin and driving him wild as Draco tried to hold still long enough for her body to adjust to him. When her inner walls stopped rippling, Draco slowly withdrew himself, almost all the way back out until only his tip remained inside her. Hermione was breathing hard and as Draco looked into her lust filled brown eyes, he thrust himself back inside her. They groaned simultaneously. This felt so much better than her hand or even her mouth around him. He felt like he'd gone to heaven and as he tenderly made love to the one girl he was never supposed to have fallen in love with, Draco went to heaven every time he buried himself back inside her.

She fit around him perfectly, snug and warm as he glided into her. He could feel his own orgasm building, but Draco gritted his teeth and pushed it back. He wanted to do this right and to do it right and make her completely forget the pain as he'd pierced her hymen, he had to give her another orgasm.

"Draco…" Hermione gasped as he picked up his pace just a little bit. Her nails raked down his back and Draco smirked when he felt her bury her teeth in the top of his shoulder. He went cross eyed when she grew impossibly tighter around him and Draco lost all control as he rutted against her while she came undone around him. He ought to have been embarrassed by the strangled groan that escaped him as he came, but Draco didn't care. Heat scorched through him, building in a tidal wave that only had one outlet and as his seed spurted into Hermione, Draco rocked himself against her groaning his release against her neck and breathing in the sweet, intoxicating scent of her skin.

* * *

**Hermione** sighed in blissful contentment as Draco Malfoy relaxed on top of her. She had her arms wrapped around him and she'd never felt so fantastic in her life. At first she had been worried about sex, but every time she gotten nervous and begun to tense up, Draco had distracted her with his exquisite mouth and expert hands until she'd forgotten her fears. When he'd buried himself inside her, it had taken her a moment to realise he'd really done it. She'd felt her body stretch and felt something inside her give way. It had hurt for just a second as he tore her hymen, but since she'd been in the middle of an orgasm, she'd barely felt the pain as her body tore open and accepted him.

When he'd paused to let her adjust to his size and girth within her, Hermione had felt completely overwhelmed and like it was too much, like she couldn't handle it. But he'd stayed still long enough that she'd gotten used to the feel of him inside her, the heat of him sinking into her and curling it's way right into her heart. Hermione ran her fingers through his silky hair as he snuggled his face into her neck. They'd actually done it, Hermione thought to herself, she and Draco Malfoy had literally given each other everything. Hermione felt happiness settle into her soul.

She remembered back to that first kiss he'd given her, the way it had been so tender and soft and Hermione smiled to know that every other first she had experienced with Draco had been undertaken with just as much care and gentility. Breathing in the warm scent of him, Hermione felt like she could just lie there with him forever. It was nice being here with him. Nice being able to hold his hand when they walked down the street. She liked that she could go up onto her tip toes and kiss him like she had when she'd taken him shopping for clothes yesterday. She adored the way he'd curled up behind her and spooned her all day on the couch as they'd watched video after video, and she loved the way he whistled to himself in the shower.

Hermione simply loved the way she could interact with Draco here. She loved not having to pretend to hate him for the rest of the wizarding world and as she lay there beneath him with him still seated snugly inside her, Hermione found herself resenting the wizarding world. She disliked the fact that just because they'd been born to different kinds of parents and put into different school houses, they were told by society that they had to be unkind to each other.

Over the past few months that they'd been together she'd found it hard enough to maintain her distance from him when they were in public, and more than once when they'd had to work together in class, Hermione had caught herself admiring him dreamily, or laughing at the joke he murmured to her. She really didn't know how she was going to be able to pretend for the rest of the world that he was a bad person now. She couldn't quite believe they'd made love and Hermione wanted to cry at the thought as she realised that if anyone from their world ever found out about the magic they'd just made without wands or spells, they would both be shunned for what they'd just done.

She hugged Draco tighter as tears slipped out the corner of her eyes at the unfairness of this. Because as Hermione laid there, the bliss of her last orgasm beginning to fade from her system, she realised the hopelessness of the situation she'd gotten herself into. She was the girl who was supposed to be all about rules and doing things properly. Yet here she was, in love with the one boy she wasn't supposed to love. And she was in love with him. She'd suspected for a little while that she might be, but with him lying on top of her, his delicious weight pressing her into the bed while he recovered from the love they'd just made, Hermione realised that he completely owned her heart. She'd gone and given it to the boy who had flat out told her he was going to break it and all Hermione could do was cry at the unfairness of their lives that mean they couldn't just be together.

* * *

**Draco **slowly lifted his head as he heard Hermione draw a shaky breath in and he felt like he'd been punched in the stomach again when he saw tears streaming down her face.

"Hermione? Oh, love I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you." He apologised instantly, figuring she could only be crying because he'd hurt her or done something wrong.

"Why are you sorry?" Hermione whispered even as more tears ran down her face.

"Did I hurt you? I know it hurt a little bit… but I thought I did it so I wouldn't hurt you much. I'm sorry I did it wrong." He blurted, stricken to see her so upset. His words seemed to make her cry even more because as he apologised again and again, she began to sob. Draco quickly pulled out of her and discarded the condom he wore so he could pull her to him, cuddling her as he tried to make amends for making her feels this way.

"Stop apologising. I'm not crying because you hurt me, which you didn't" Hermione said thickly between sobs. Draco's heart dropped. If she wasn't crying because he'd accidently hurt her, then she was crying because she regretted doing this with him.

"I'm sorry I talked you into this Hermione. I knew you'd regret being with me" he apologised miserably, feeling like he might cry too.

"Oh Draco" Hermione breathed sadly "I don't regret it. Not for a second. You were wonderful and it was…. There aren't even words to describe how happy I am." Hermione told him, rolling to look at him, entangling her legs with his and pulling him into her arms.

"Then why are you crying?" Draco asked, baffled now. If he hadn't done anything wrong and she was happy, why would she be sobbing like this? Hermione hiccupped adorably and Draco's heart gave a squeeze as she blinked at him through puffy red eyes.

"I don't want to go back to Hogwarts" she whispered to him miserably "I want to stay here with you where I don't have to pretend I don't feel this way about you. I want to be able to kiss you whenever I feel like it, not just when we have prefect duty. I hate having to pretend I don't care about you, and it's been getting harder and harder to pretend I don't. How am I supposed to pretend now?"

Draco felt miserable about their situation. These past few days with her had been the best of his life and he dreaded the end of the holidays when they would have to go back to school. He was sure someone would notice that he was different now. He felt different. He was in love. In love and he'd made love for the first time in his life, with the girl he was in love with. He felt like he could walk on air.

"You'll do it by remembering how much your friends would hate you if they knew you were with me." Draco whispered to her, feeling in his soul just how lame that sounded.

"My friend are supposed to love me and support me in whatever decisions I choose to make. If they can't do that then they aren't really my friends, they're just selfish children." Hermione argued with him.

"I know, my love, I hate it too. I live for the days we have prefect duty and the times we get paired together in class. It's hard enough trying to pretend I hate you from day to day, but in those times all I want to do is hold your hands or laugh when you tell me a joke."

"I hate your family for buying into this racist nonsense" Hermione whispered to him as she buried her face against his chest.

"Me too, Mon Amour, me too" Draco told her, cuddling her closer.

"A small part of me hates the fact that my best friend is one of the people who hates you most. If I had made different friends, it wouldn't matter so much that we're together." Hermione said softly.

"A big part of me hates absolutely everyone who isn't you." Draco whispered back to his girlfriend.

He hated their situation and he hated it even more that he would have to break up with her in order to save his own worthless life someday. All because his stupid father and grandfather had fallen in with a lunatic and bought into the bollocks that they were better than people like Hermione. When he next saw his father, Draco would have to do everything in his power to restrain himself from punching the man right in his face and then hexing him into oblivion, he hated him so much. If it weren't for his mother being just as stuck as he was, Draco would've already walked away from it all by now. But the Dark Lord would torture her and probably kill her if he tried to leave or betray him now.

Hermione fell asleep in his arms as he held her like that and Draco smiled at his sleeping girlfriend. He would do anything to keep her forever, but forever wouldn't be very long for him if he got himself killed trying to flee the Darkness. Merlin he loved her. It was like nothing he'd ever felt before and Draco wanted to shout it from the rooftops. His shoulder twinged when he tightened his arms around the goddess sleeping soundly against his chest, and Draco looked down at the mark she'd left on him.

There on the top of his shoulder, just below the curve of his neck was a set of teeth marks. Blood was smeared a little bit on his pale skin, and Draco cursed silently that he couldn't use magic outside of school while he was at her house. Very slowly he extricated himself from around Hermione, smiling at her fondly when she didn't even wake up. He dug around in his trunk until he found the little jar of salve he'd concocted at school for just such an occasion as this and he smeared some of it onto the wound she'd given him.

Draco hissed as agony speared through him. His own twisted nature had spurred him to make this stuff and it was an evil substance. It sank into his skin through the marks she'd left on him, damaging every layer of skin and tissue beneath the wound so that it would scar, marking him as hers for life. One day he would look back at his life and smile at the memories of how he'd earned each mark she'd left on him. A part of him was appalled by the thrill it gave him, even though it would've hurt less to have been stabbed or Crucioed, than to apply the evil salve to his skin. It bubbled malevolently, hissing and stinging, burning into his skin and doing irreparable damage, but as the viscous pain began to subside, Draco couldn't help but smile. It might make him twisted and weird to endure the pain just to have a set of teeth marks scarred into his shoulder forever, but Draco couldn't help thinking that it was more like a permanent reminder of his first time. A perfect signature that marked him as Hermione's unequivocally. Maybe it was twisted, but as Draco climbed back into bed and gathered the girl he loved more than anything into his arms, he knew that every time he looked at that scar he would think of how in love he was with the girl who'd marked him and he'd smile at the memories he'd made this night.

* * *

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviews. Pretty please leave me a review and let me know what you thought of this chapter and what you think of the story as a whole. Much Love- Kitten xx**


	9. Mistletoe & Holly

**Mistletoe and Holly**

**Draco** awoke to a strange flash of white light beyond his eyelids and his wand was out from beneath his pillow before he'd even opened his eyes. His lips were poised to spit out curses that would end the life of whoever had awoken him with such a brightly lit spell but he stopped dead when he caught sight of the messy haired girl wearing only thigh high socks and underwear standing at the end of the bed. Draco stared at Hermione blearily as he heard her giggle impishly before she blinded him with another one of those bright whitish silver lights. Blinking stupidly at the pain, Draco squinted at Hermione, trying to understand what she was doing to him.

"What are you doing?" he asked sleepily when he realised she had something black clutched in her hands and her in front of her eyes as though examining it closely. Draco squinted some more when she lowered it so he could see her brown eyes gleaming secretively. Reaching up to scratch his chest Draco was blinded again by whatever she was doing.

"Is that a camera?" he asked suddenly as it occurred to his sleepy brain that the bright flashes were consistent with those of a camera.

"You look adorable when you wake up startled" Hermione told him sweetly before snapping another picture of him as he began to glare at her.

"Photographic evidence makes it a little bit difficult to keep our relationship a secret from the entire wizarding world Hermione" Draco told his girlfriend sternly.

"Who's ever going to find them?" Hermione retorted. "Besides, they're muggle photographs, not wizarding ones so they can very easily be developed and live in the bottom of my sock drawer for the rest of time."

"Why are you taking photos of me while I'm asleep anyway?" he asked her, slinging his arm over his eyes and flopping back down on the bed.

"You're awfully grumpy for a boy who got laid last night and woke up to me dressed like this on Christmas morning." Hermione told him, sounding amused rather than agitated at him.

"It's Christmas day?" Draco gasped, sitting up suddenly and staring around in horror expecting to see one of his family's House Elves waiting to cart the gifts he'd bought for his parents back to them.

"What's wrong?" Hermione asked, sounding completely confused.

"One of the elves is bound to see us together. Bloody hell!" Draco cursed, flinging back the covers and leaping to his feet.

"They've already been, Mi Corazon" Hermione whispered to him "I woke up when I heard the loud crack of apparition. You're family really ought to treat those elves better. The poor thing just about died of fright when I offered her a Christmas bickie." Hermione admonished and Draco had to suppress a groan before Hermione could see him roll his eyes about the treatment of house elves. She just didn't seem to understand that the elves mostly enjoyed their work and were offended at the idea of being set free.

"You offered Paski a biscuit? Hermione how the bloody hell do you expect to keep the world, namely my family and the Dark Lord from finding out that we're together if you go around offering my father's elves biscuits? Please tell me you didn't reveal your name?" Draco growled, hopping on one foot as he tried to pull on one of the pairs of muggle trousers Hermione had bought for him.

"She was very grateful for the biscuit, and for the cup of tea I offered her actually" Hermione told him, and Draco did groan this time. Old Paski was just the type of elf who would sit down and have a cup of tea with a witch or wizard, and most of that was entirely his own fault because he actually liked the old bat-eared thing. She'd been his nursemaid and almost constant companion until he'd gone to Hogwarts and as a kid who thought little of the other pure blood children, Draco had counted Paski, Nobba and his mother as his only real friends. Even now, the only real friend he had was the girl watching him bemusedly and the elf she had a cup of tea with.

"You didn't have tea with her dressed like that did you?" Draco asked, eyeing her semi-naked body hungrily.

"No, I put my robe on. But I don't understand why you're panicking so much about the fact that Paski and I had a cup of tea. I think we'll be great friends." Hermione told him as she came up and wrapped her arms around him snuggling her face into his still bare chest.

"What if she tells my parents?" Draco asked her, cuddling her in spite of the stress that had his heart pounding fearfully. If his father found out he'd lied to him, he'd have Draco's head. But if Lucius were to find out that Draco had lied to his family in order to spend time with the most hated mudblood Hogwarts had seen in years, Lucius would likely have a heart attack and then Crucio Draco into oblivion.

"I wondered about that when she first arrived, since she had frozen when she caught sight of you asleep in bed with me when I looked at her she said 'Mister Draco is not supposed to be here. He is supposing to be at School. What is he doing with a girl in his arms?' So I smiled at her and wished her a Merry Christmas." Hermione told his clavicle

"What did she say to that?" Draco asked her, heart squeezing painfully in fear of being caught. It wasn't so much that he would die that bothered him, but once Lucius was done torturing Draco he'd hunt down Hermione too and torture her into oblivion for causing such rebellion. Draco could hear the words his father would use in his head. Words like scummy whore and temptress daughter of filth.

"She wiggled her ears at me before wishing me a Merry Christmas as well. We had tea and a nice little discussion about you while you were sleeping."

* * *

**Hermione** smiled when she felt Draco stiffen in her arms at hearing that. She and Paski had had a lovely cup of tea and Paski had asked many questions about Hermione and Draco. At first Hermione had been reluctant to admit anything to the curious old House Elf, but as Hermione had pulled on her bathrobe, she'd noticed the way the old elf had crept closer to the bed where Draco had lain, sleeping soundly.

"Who is you Miss?" The elf had whispered without taking her eyes off the young wizard "Who is you that you makes my Master sleep so soundly? Master Draco has not slept such since he was a boy. Who is you to taking away his terrors?"

Hermione had watched as the old elf had stroked her hand across Draco's forehead, as though wondering at the feel of touching the skin there without+ the furrows Hermione suspected he often wore even in sleep. So Hermione had told her that she was Draco's forbidden girlfriend, someone his parents did not approve of, but someone who loved him.

"You is special" Paski had whispered to her "You is very special Miss, else Master Draco would not risk the anger of Master Malfoy."

Hermione had asked the elf that she not tell Lucius or Narcissa that Draco had been anywhere near Hermione and Paski's bat-like elf ears had drooped slightly as she had nibbled on the biscuit Hermione had given her.

"Miss Hermione, you is asking much of Paski. Paski would be beaten if she were known to be hiding secrets from the masters….. But Paski's loyalty has always been to Master Draco. She is his elf. Master Draco… him was happy once…. But then he went away to that nasty school and the masters say do this, say that, do this say this do that. And Master Draco is doing it because Master Malfoy… him is a nasty man…. Him is liking to cause pain when him pride is hurted….. Master Draco is being unhappy a long time Miss Hermione. Him not know it…. Or him not admit it, even to hisself, but Paski knows….. Then Master Draco not comes home for Christmas and Paski worries him is afraid of those at home. There is nasty wizards about Miss Hermione. Nasty wizards do nasty things and Paski is not disobeying them because they is killing Nobba when he obeys too slow. Miss Hermione's house is much safer for Master Draco."

The elf had nodded her head and finished her tea while watching Hermione with her bright blue eyes over the rim of her tea cup. When she had finished she had fished out several parcels from inside her stained pillow case uniform and carried them over to the fake Christmas tree Hermione and Draco had set up late last night and put them underneath it. She had picked up the ones Draco had stuck under there, addressed to his parents and wiggled her ears at Hermione with a smile.

"Paski is not knowing if Miss Hermione is spending time with Master Draco, but Paski hopes that Miss Hermione knows how special Mater Draco thinkses her. Please tell Master Draco Paski is wishing him a happy Christmas." With that she had winked and disappeared with a loud crack and Hermione had sat back down, astonished to have someone besides herself and Draco know their secret.

"Paski asked me to wish you a Happy Christmas" Hermione told the bare chested boy in her arms. The bare chested boy she had had sex with last night. The bare chested boy she was in love with. "She said she is not knowing Miss Hermione and Master Draco is spending time together and then she winked at me."

Draco sighed explosively and Hermione wondered how long he'd been holding his breath.

"If anyone ever suspects anything is going on with me, Paski is probably the one they will ask about it." Draco told her softly "You put her in danger by telling her the truth about us. Since I went to school it was expected that I stopped regarding Paski so highly, but a child with few friends is often reluctant to ever entirely give up the few he has. Father wanted to have Paski beheaded while I was away at school in my first year, completely severing the connection and forcing me to make real friends. Suitable friends. Mother forbade it. It was one of the few times she fought him on something and Father realised that she felt strongly enough about it that she would leave him if he had my only friend beheaded. Father hates Paski all the more because he blames her for the fact that he had to find out the hard way that Mother loves me and cares more about my happiness and well-being, than she loves him." Draco told her softly and Hermione felt her heart squeeze painfully.

"You do a wonderful job of appearing to be the spoiled, pampered heir to the Malfoy fortune when you live in an abusive household." Hermione whispered to him, recalling Paski's words about Lucius Malfoy enjoying delivering pain to those who wounded his pride.

Draco froze for a moment, before pulling back from her and staring down at her. He looked outraged and slightly frightened as his silver eyes bored into hers.

"What did Paski tell you?" Draco growled. Hermione crossed her arms, suddenly aware of the fact that she was only dressed in her underthings and not liking the way his hands clenched tightly around her upper arms.

"Master Malfoy is a nasty wizard…. Him likes to cause pain when his pride is hurted. Paski would be beaten if she were known to be keeping secrets from her master" Hermione hissed to her glaring boyfriend, imitating the elf's poor grammar and squeaky voice. Draco's eye flashed angrily and his fingers bit into Hermione's upper arms. Hermione glared right back at him, feeling her familiar indignation and anger at the idea of House elves being mistreated, along with a vicious arrow of hatred piercing her heart at the idea of anyone hurting the boy glaring at her right now.

"Master Draco is not coming home and Paski is worried Master Draco is afraid of the nasty wizards. There is nasty wizards about miss Hermione and nasty wizards is doing nasty things. Paski is not disobeying them because the nasty wizards is killing Nobba because he obeyed too slowly" Hermione ground out "Miss Hermione's house is safer for Master Draco."

Draco suddenly released her, utter shock on his face.

"They killed Nobba?" he whispered in horror "Is that what she told you? They killed him for obeying too slowly?"

Hermione's eyes searched Draco's suddenly pain riddle expression "That's what she told me… Draco are you alright?"

"Nobba….. Nobba was Paski's mate, her best friend and husband…. He was mute. Grandfather had his tongue cut out years ago…. He can't be dead. Nobba was Paski's and Paski is mine. Nobba belonged to Mother and he was fiercely loyal to her. She's the reason Grandfather had Nobba's tongue cut out, because he stood up to father and Grandfather while Mother was pregnant with me. They wanted her to go to some ball or do or some other stupid thing and she could barely move for morning sickness and lethargy. She nearly died carrying me to term and the old bastard wanted her to get out of bed and keep up pureblood appearances. Nobba told him to stuff his wand somewhere unpleasant and that Mother wasn't to leave her bed until after I was born."

Hermione watched the shine begin to build in Draco's eyes as he held back tears and she realised that the death of this elf hit him hard. Slowly he sank down to sit on the end of Hermione's bed, looking broken hearted as a single tear escaped the corner of his right eye and slid down his cheek.

"Why wouldn't she tell me?" Draco breathed brokenly "Why would she keep this from me?... It was Him…" He spat, tears suddenly replaced with fiery anger that turned the silver of his eyes to such a dark grey they were almost black "He must have killed Nobba, else mother would've told me, if not killed the man who killed Nobba."

Hermione stared at Draco in shock as angry black and red sparks issued from the wand he had clutched tightly in his fist. She'd never seen him look so angry.

"Why wouldn't she at least tell me?" Draco demanded angrily, staring up at Hermione. Beneath the anger in his eyes Hermione could see the pain and confusion swirling like a whirlpool of turmoil. Hermione felt her heart squeeze for him, hurting for the confusion and loss and betrayal he was feeling at the loss of a treasured friend, as well as the pain of knowing his mother had kept it a secret from him even though it sounded like the death of this old mute elf would be hurting Narcissa even more than it was hurting Draco.

Slowly Hermione sat down on the bed next to the stricken boy she was in love with and wrapped her arms around him softly.

"Maybe she couldn't tell you Mi Corazon, maybe she is hurting just as much as you but isn't allowed to express her anguish over the murder of this Nobba because V-Voldemort killed him." Draco jerked violently in her arms to hear Hermione use the real name of the evil wizard. "After all, she is expected to believe that all creatures who are not pureblood witches or wizards are beneath her notice and of little to no worth. She wouldn't be able to grieve for the loss of her most faithful servant because she is supposed to pretend he means nothing. How can she write to you and tell you about her grief or even that this has happened when it's not supposed to affect her and her mail is probably being screened?"

Hermione tried to comfort the angry boy in her arms but Draco seemed to be trying to restore the placement of the lid he kept on the container of his emotions because he remained silent and stiff in her arms.

"I'm sorry for you loss Mi Corazon" Hermione whispered as she pressed a kiss to the top of his shoulder "Would you like to have a nice warm shower while I cook you some breakfast? It might make you feel better." For a long time Draco didn't respond and Hermione began to wonder if he had even heard what she had said to him, but eventually he turned his head to look at her, one of his hands reaching over to brush down the side of her cheek gently.

"Did I hurt you, Mon Amour?" Draco whispered to her, his eyes searching her arms for the spots where he had gripped her so tightly. Hermione stared at him in surprise because his voice was suddenly soft and pleasant and yet completely devoid of emotion. She wondered how he did it. How could he possibly manage to rein in his temper and anger and anguish and loss and pain in such a skilful way that if she hadn't been watching him the entire time, she wouldn't even have suspected him of his outburst moments ago? When his eyes found the red marks on Hermione's biceps he frowned at them.

"I'm sorry Hermione" he whispered to her, his flint coloured eyes searching her face.

"They don't hurt" Hermione replied.

"That doesn't matter. I shouldn't have grabbed you at all. It's not your fault that Paski chose to tell you anything about my father. I had no right to touch you at all and yet I've gone and gripped you hard enough that you will have bruises." His face and voice were still completely devoid of emotion in spite of his furrowed brow and the frown he wore.

"I'm sorry for hurting you Mon Amour" he whispered to her "I think I will go and have that shower."

Hermione watched as he pulled out of her embrace and strode from the room heading for the bathroom down the hall baffled and slightly disturbed by the way in which he had managed to completely cut himself off emotionally.

By the time school went back Draco still seemed a little distant. He'd managed to rouse himself to a smile on Christmas day as he'd opened the gift Hermione had given him and sometimes she managed to completely melt the wall he'd put up. Some days he seemed like he had for the first few days they'd been in London, completely unreserved and happy. Laughing and joking with her, passionate and gentle as they made love until neither of them could walk properly, completely at ease and relaxed with one another. But other times he seemed as distant as he had before they'd gotten together. He seemed closed off and detached from any and all emotion sometimes when he'd sit quietly and listen as Hermione played the piano in the living room. He wasn't cold to her, and often roused himself back to being as comfortable and happy and light hearted with her in such a way that Hermione almost forgot his grief and anguish for a few moments.

Yet for all that when he wasn't happy and smiling and laughing with her, when he had a few moments of silence to sit and ponder things, he seemed to close himself off. The logical part of Hermione's mind told her that it was his way of dealing with his grief at the loss of a much loved friend and at the pain of having his mother unable to tell him about such things. Hermione suspected he was cutting himself off from feeling what he truly felt concerning those things and she recalled the way Paski had told her that Draco had been unhappy for a long time, since he went to Hogwarts at age eleven, even though he didn't admit it to anyone, even himself.

The more she watched him do it, the more Hermione seemed to learn about her boyfriend. She realised that the past four years she had shared a classroom with him, she'd been more aware of him than she realised, and she suddenly understood that he really was one of the greatest actors she had ever seen. The way he pretended to be a sneering, spoiled, rich prat around his friends and around the rest of the student body within Hogwarts was quite literally, entirely an act. He pretended to like his friends and cronies, he pretended to disdain his classes and all students who weren't in Slytherin. He pretended that his life was all about being better than everyone else because he was spoiled and rich, he pretended that his family was spectacular and that he utterly adored them, he pretended he was a firm believer in all the evil nonsense Voldemort and his father spouted. Yet Hermione knew the truth. She knew it was an act.

She could see through it because she knew him so well. She could see in their classes the way his hero worship of his father masked a deep rooted disdain and perhaps even hatred for Lucius Malfoy. She could see the way he regarded those he called friend with cool, detached tolerance and nothing more. Hermione had learned over the course of the holidays that life as a Malfoy was nowhere near as pleasant, cushy or comfortable as Draco and his parents would have the world believe. She'd learned that Lucius Malfoy ruled his household with a hard hand and ready wand, and though Draco had not admitted it, she suspected that Draco was often on the receiving end of Lucius' abuse and thoughtlessness.

"Mon Amour?" Draco whispered to Hermione through the darkness as he lay cuddled up behind he in bed. It was the last night of Christmas break and tomorrow they would go back into the wizarding world where they would have to pretend they weren't a couple, that they'd never looked at each other with anything other than loathing and disdain, that they'd never made love or fallen in love with each other.

"Hmm?" Hermione hummed softly. In spite of how comfortable and warm and safe and loved she felt with him cuddled up behind her, Hermione felt sad. The idea of going back to Hogwarts seemed almost repugnant when the alternative could be to stay here with Draco forever.

"Thank you" Draco whispered softly.

"What are you thanking me for Draco?" Hermione asked him.

"For not pushing. I know that you hate not knowing absolutely everything, but thank you for not pushing me to talk or explain about my moodiness. I know it can't have been easy for you." He murmured to her, fingers trailing lightly over her stomach in what Hermione suddenly realised was the pattern of his signature.

Hermione didn't know what to say to his thanks, so she just turned her head to press her lips tenderly to the inside of his elbow where his arm rested beneath her head.

"I'm sorry I've been distant love" Draco continued "It's how I deal with things that upset me or make me angry. I lock them inside a vault within my mind so that I can't feel them, so I don't do something rash or stupid like catch the Night Bus home and commit murder. Sometimes locking up so much emotion means my happiness is dampened or locked away temporarily as well and I'm sorry if I've ruined you Christmas because I haven't been as cheery as I should've been."

"Draco, the only way you could've ruined my Christmas would have been if you had left. Having you here and being with you, with just you, it's been wonderful. I don't want to go back tomorrow. I'd rather we stay here where I don't have to pretend that I don't feel this way about you." Slowly Hermione rolled until she was facing him, even though she couldn't see his eyes through the darkness. She reached up to cup his cheeks tenderly, feeling the hardness of his jaw and the silkiness of his skin.

"I'm sorry I got you into this love" Draco whispered sadly "It would've been easier if I'd never kissed you."

"Easier maybe…." Hermione murmured "But sadder too. If you hadn't, I wouldn't know you the way I do now. I'd still pity you instead of understanding you and caring about you."

"You pitied me before I kissed you?" Draco asked, sounding shocked.

"Yes. I pitied that you felt so strongly about bad things and let you family and you reputation lead you."

"You knew I didn't mean it?" he asked.

"No. I suspected that you did mean the cruel things you said, but I pitied you for not taking the time to learn about things and be better. It made me sad that you so blindly hated those around you without taking the time to learn that many of the people you pick on have personalities, qualities and faults, hopes and dreams, fears and weaknesses. You didn't bother to take the time to know any of them, you just reacted to their suspicion that they thought you a spoiled rich tosser with an inflated ego. It made me sad that you were so blind, and sometimes made me angry when you were thoughtlessly cruel. It really made me angry though when you were purposely cruel and unkind, like that day in third year as you Crabbe and Goyle were waiting and watching to see Buckbeak executed for _your_ stupidity."

Draco was quiet for a long time and when he finally spoke he sounded concerned, amused and baffled all at the same time.

"You've never been afraid of me or any of the other Slytherin's, have you Hermione?"

"Why would I be afraid of any of you? Until the end of last year none of you had reason to inspire fear in people, though you all tried and you succeed with many. I suppose I never had the time to be afraid because I was too busy pitying you all. You'd been raised to misinformed and outdated beliefs, and all of you run around as though the wicked things you speak of or know about are acceptable practices." Hermione sighed thoughtfully "I suppose many of the students fear Slytherin students because of the house reputation, and because you all have wicked relatives involved in unsavoury things. None of them seem to have thought through to the part where most of you might be romanticised by the ideals of your parents, but you're all just as afraid to commit heinous acts and utter evil curses as the rest of us."

"If that were true then why do most of us continue to do it?" Draco argued.

"You've answered that yourself. You're all taught that family and reputation must come before all, and now all of you actually have something to fear. V-Voldemort isn't afraid of killing someone who displeases him. From what you've told me he's happy to kill anyone for just looking sideways at him if he has no use for their existence, because how else could he inspire fear in his followers in order to keep them all in line and force many of the less willing to do his bidding? After all, there is a reason he has only select people among his inner circle as his Death Eaters. The rest are told they don't deserve the honour, but it is how he ensures that those idiots outside the inner circle have something to strive for if they seek to gain his favour, while rewarding and trapping those who do please him, making it easier to find anyone with the mark and to brand those individuals with a permanent signpost to the rest of the world that the bearer in untrustworthy and disloyal to the wizarding race."

"Sometimes you baffle me with how brilliant your mind is Mon Amour." Draco whispered softly, cuddling Hermione closer and pressing kisses to the side of her neck.

Hermione sighed at the feel of his warm lips against her skin and brought her hands down to tease one of Draco's nipples as goose pimples raced across her skin and desire pooled between her thighs.

* * *

**Draco** skimmed his hands over Hermione's body, her silky smooth skin distracting him from thoughts of anything but her and how much he loved her. His pulse pounded in his ears and fire seared through his blood at the feel of her responding beneath the touch of his hands and lips. The past two weeks he had spent with Hermione had been magical and the idea that this was their last tonight had been eating at him all day. They'd gone out for dinner tonight, and in spite of the cold they had strolled along the streets perusing the store fronts. As they'd walked he'd wrapped his arms around her shoulders, cuddling her close to his side.

She had taken him to what she claimed was her favourite place in all of London and Draco had laughed when Hermione had led him through the busy Christmas stalls down by the London Eye. There had been music playing and other couples out and about in spite of the cold evening had been dancing. He'd shocked her when he'd offered her his hand and gently tugged her out onto the makeshift dancefloor amid the dancing muggles. It had felt good to pull her close and sway with her in time to the music and a muggle with what Hermione claimed was a Polaroid camera had come over to them as they stopped dancing and had handed them a photograph.

In it Draco had had his eyes closed and his lips pressed to the top of Hermione's head, his hands on her lower back while she snuggled her face into his chest. There was nothing all that special about the photo, except that for Draco it was like a memento of what it felt like to be allowed to love the girl in his arms. He'd admonished Hermione for taking pictures of them all break, even though by the end he'd been smiling right along with her, especially when she had dragged him to a muggle fun park and braved her fears to show him the closest thing muggles had to flying on brooms, something called a rollercoaster. It hadn't been as good as flying but he supposed it came awfully close.

Draco held his breath as he focused back on the beautiful face of the girl beneath him. She had turned a lamp on and in the dim light he caught his breath at her beauty. Her messy hair had been tamed into two plaits, and her lustfilled eyes peered up at him hungrily. The feel of her naked body beneath him made Draco's heart pound and he felt his own lust creep over him as he aligned his body with hers. The diamond star around her neck gleamed in the dim light and Draco waited for Hermione to meet his hot gaze with one of her own before he slowly inched himself inside her.

Hermione whimpered as he entered her, her fingers clutching hungrily at him, nails digging into the flesh of his lower back. It felt amazing to make love to her, even better than it had the first time now that her body was accustomed to his. The feel of her lady garden clutching him so tightly had his eyes crossing with desire and he hadn't even started to thrust yet. Draco bit the inside of his cheek to distract himself from the way she made him feel as he began to move within her.

It didn't take long for her to reach her climax and Draco allowed himself a smug smile to know that he could bring her undone so easily. The sound of her laughing moan as she orgasmed resounded in his head as he picked up the pace.

"Draco…" Hermione murmured breathily and Draco opened his eyes to look at her. Her head was tipped back in ecstasy, exposing her throat which was adorned with no less than nine love bites, her eyes were closed as she smiled blissfully. Draco grinned though she couldn't see it, feeling his heart give a painful squeeze at how much he loved her.

Draco didn't know where the thoughts came from, unbidden, but as Draco buried his face against her neck, filling his head with the sweet scent of her perfume and drawing her soft flesh into his mouth, several images flowed through his mind, much like the images he'd been so fascinated with on muggle television. In the pictures was Hermione smiling shyly at him from beneath a white veil, dressed in a splendid gown of white silk that made her look every bit like the princesses from the muggle 'Disney' movies she'd made him watch this Christmas. In the next his hands, lifting her veil and peering into her beautiful face, his heart beating so hard with his love for her that each beat hurt. Himself grasping her hands as a wizard in a purple robe performed spells while he vowed to love her for the rest of his life. On and on the images rolled before finally coming to rest on an image of himself and Hermione dancing together just like they had done tonight in the middle of muggle London, while white-blonde messy haired children danced around the two of them happily.

Draco roared as his own orgasm crashed down upon him and he heard Hermione let out a high pitched version of her own orgasm sound, cut off slightly as she gasped in pain. Draco barely heard her though, instead focusing on the blood and fire and magic pulsing through him wildly as he realised that the image reel in his mind was everything he wanted for his life and everything he could never have.

"Draco you're hurting me" Hermione whispered to him and Draco suddenly realised that even though he stopped pounding into her, he also gone from suckling the flesh of her neck to somehow having his teeth buried in the top of her shoulder. He could taste her blood thick on his tongue and Draco quickly unhinged his jaw, releasing her before he could hurt her anymore.

"Shite! Hermione I' sorry I didn't mean to" Draco apologised as he crawled off her and saw the way fat drops of blood ran from the teeth shaped puncture holes he'd left in her flesh. "I don't know what came over me. Are you alright, love?" He asked her, knowing as he said it that he was lying. He knew exactly what had come over him though he hadn't realised that his thoughts would drive him to such actions.

"I'm alright" Hermione assured him as he fussed, trying to stem the bleeding. Draco watched her turn to stare down at the bite mark he'd left on her. He bit his lip nervously to see how Hermione would react given that he'd just marked her badly enough to make a scar. That twisted little part of him that had caused him to permanently scar himself as hers was laughing manically in his mind at the idea that he had marked her as his own in a way that would leave a scar, but Draco kept the expression of triumph off his face as he waited to see how she would handle what he had done.

"No I'll have a scar like yours" she whispered, reaching out to brush her fingers over the set of teeth marks she'd left on him two weeks ago.

"Not exactly like mine" Draco murmured back to her, feeling like an idiot but seemingly unable to still his traitorous tongue from revealing how twisted he was.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked, tilting her head to one side

"Yours will scar like mine, but eventually it will fade away and you won't have it anymore. Mine won't fade."

Hermione looked even more confused "But yours will fade too Draco, that's how scars work."

Draco found himself shaking his head even though he didn't want Hermione to know about the awful salve he'd made to wear any mark she left on him for the rest of her life. He didn't know what was wrong with him but suddenly it seemed like he had no control of his tongue or his brain as he soldiered on, digging his own twisted grave.

"Mine won't."

Draco watched the light click on in her eyes as she realised he must have done something to make it so that the scar wouldn't fade away.

"What did you do Mi Corazon?" Hermione asked him softly even as a tear of blood slowly trickled down over her clavicle and ran towards her breast. Draco stared at her, not wanting to admit that he was weird and twisted and liked the idea of having a permanent reminder of the things they'd done together, but unable to stop himself from telling her the truth.

"Let's just say I'll carry every mark you leave on me for the rest of my life and leave it at that" Draco said stiffly, getting up to discard the condom he wore and clean himself after their love-making.

"What do you mean Draco? What did you do? Is that why the little fingernail marks I left on the back of your neck are scars instead of having healed and gone away by now?" Hermione demanded, following him across the room and somehow managing to trap him between her bed and her desk.

"Don't worry about it Hermione" Draco said shortly, trying to think of something that would distract her from this and coming up empty.

"You did something to them didn't you? You did something with dark magic to make them scar permanently" Hermione accused him and Draco cringed a little to hear it put so bluntly. "Draco…. Why?"

She sounded confused rather than repulsed or angry and when Draco looked at her, she was frowning slightly and biting that bottom lip of hers. The words came spilling out before he could stop them.

"You won't understand, and if you do you'll probably be repulsed, but in the wizarding world there is an old tradition of marking another as yours…. My father has my mother's name carved into his chest over his heart. Mother apparently has father's initials carved into her thigh. It's an old and barbaric tradition phased out by all but the most twisted pureblood families, especially after the Dark Lord used the same kind of method to create the Dark mark he leaves on is Death Eater's. To magically scar another person marks them as yours, brands your ownership of that person into their skin, warning all who seek you, that you belong to another…. Every mark you leave on me I earn through passion and marks me temporarily as yours…. I guess I wanted a reminder. At school I know the curses to make a scar permanent, but I manage to make a salve that does the same thing, permanently damaged every layer of skin beneath the scar so I'll wear it forever." Draco looked at her helplessly for a moment.

"The nail marks on the back of my neck are a permanent reminder of the day I gave you your first orgasm, the teeth marks a permanent reminder of our first time….. it makes me twisted, but I like the idea of being branded as yours Hermione. Making the scars permanent immortalises the memory so that one day when I'm a grey old bastard and my memory is failing me, I'll still wear physical proof that I was allowed to touch a fallen star. I'll have proof for my own failing mind, proof to convince myself that it wasn't just a wonderful dream."

Hermione was watching Draco with a strange expression on her face and Draco felt himself cringe a little at what she must think of him now, knowing that he was twisted and masochistic. That he'd irreparably harmed himself for something she probably thought of as being barbaric.

"Draco…. I never want to forget either" Hermione whispered, stepping closer until she could rest her head on his chest and wrap her arms around his hips. Draco's breath caught in his throat to hear her say that. Surely she couldn't mean it. Perhaps she didn't understand that if she did it too it would create a thin magical bond between them.

"What are you saying Hermione?" he asked her softly.

"You said you have a salve to make scars last forever. Can I have some for the mark you left on me? Please?"

Draco felt sure he was dreaming, that this was some crazy hallucination.

"If you do it too it will link us Hermione. Permanently. We've exchanged blood doing this, and to seal it will magically link us, if only thinly."

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked, tipping her head back to look at him.

"What do you know of the Dark Mark Hermione?" Draco asked her. Hermione shrugged.

"Not much, I know what it looks like and that Death Eaters have them… why?"

"Death Eaters wear the mark, branding them as belonging to the Dark lord. There is a ritual that goes with it that I don't know much of, but I do know that when the Dark Lord came back the mark on father's arm grew more and more noticeable every day, and when he regained a body he pressed his finger to the mark on one of his Death Eaters, summoning his property back to him. It doesn't mean they have to come, which is why so many were unable, but the mark provides a connection."

"I don't understand what that has to do with this." Hermione admitted, indicating to the bite mark he'd left on her shoulder.

"I'll show you. Go stand across the room, as far from me as you can get and face t other way." Draco instructed her. When she had done it, Draco reached up and pressed his fingers firmly against the mark on his shoulder. Across the room Hermione gasped.

"Why do I suddenly have an image of you in my head?" Hermione whispered.

"Because of the mark. I added a few things to the salve. Mother told me the connection between her and my father means that if either of them firmly presses against their scar, they burn to be together. I altered the salve I made so that instead of burning you would get an image of me. The same type of thing is used in the Dark Mark, allowing the Death Eaters to find the Dark lord and vice versa. Ultimately it is a summons because they all bear the mark. Since this scar marks me as yours, when I press it, you can see me in your mind wherever I am and know I'm alive. Mostly it's symbolic, but that is an added perk. If you have one as well, a permanent mark from me, it links us a little closer than that."

"In what way?" Hermione asked, her fascination and preoccupation with knowledge overriding anything else she must be feeling.

"Well a Dark Mark brands a Death Eater as belonging to the Dark Lord, but he doesn't have a mark in the same way though he may have it tattooed on for all I know. In that instance such a mark brands ownership of servant and master. Right now, my scar marks me as belonging to you and lets me communicate with you, but you don't have one in return. If you have a permanent scar from me, and I from you, it changes the link from a master-servant kind of ownership, to the kind of ownership that comes with marriage since usually two people only link like this if they're married, it is more like camaraderie ownership than that of an insignia. Do you understand?"

"But what does it do? How does it link us? Would we suddenly be able to communicate telepathically? Does our magic fuse, our life forces? What does it do?" Hermione persisted.

"Well it hurts for one thing." Draco told her, "But it's not an exact science. It won't link your life to mine or anything like that. I think it just allows us to show each other where we are and shows the rest of the world that we're owned." Draco admitted, uncertain of what exactly such a bond could do. His mother had never been all that clear on how it affected her and his father.

Hermione was quiet for a while as she came back over to sit on the bed, wrapping a blanket around her naked body. Draco watched her, wondering what she was thinking about the whole situation and how she felt to know that an image of him would appear in her mind every time he pressed on the bite mark she had left on his neck. Moving over to sit next to her, Draco wrapped his arms around her, noticing the way the blood that had leaked down her chest from the bite mark he'd left on her shoulder had dried on her skin but still oozed a little at the site.

"Mon Amour, don't feel like you have to do it too. I'm a little twisted, and it hurts like all bollocks, more than the Cruciatus curse does. But if you're not going to do it, you need to put something on the bite mark I gave you or it will probably get infected." Draco told her, cuddling her to his chest and pressing a kiss to the top of her head.

"I think I want to do it too…." Hermione whispered "It's a little twisted I suppose, but I kind of like the idea of having a reminder of being here with you like this."

"Are you sure Hermione? It really hurts." Draco cautioned her.

Hermione nodded and squared her shoulders resolutely. Feeling slightly reluctant to let her hurt herself this way even though he'd done it himself, Draco got to his feet and dug around in his trunk until he found the little pot of salve.

"Do you want to do it or do you want me to put it one you?" he ask he as he sat down next to her.

"Um… you better do it so that you get all of it." Hermione whispered. Nodding, Draco unscrewed the lid and dipped his finger in, using the back of his fingernail to keep the awful stuff from connecting with his skin since it would burn like a chemical burn if he touched it with bare skin. Slowly he reached up to spread it on the mark he'd left on Hermione before having an idea.

"Mon Amour you had better bite down on a pillow or something to keep from biting your lip or your tongue." Draco said, remembering how much it hurt and knowing Hermione had never been on the receiving end of the Cruciatus curse. Looking dubious, Hermione did as he suggested, biting down on a cushion before nodding at Draco to do it. Hating himself for having to hurt her, but thrilled that Hermione actually wanted to be permanently marked by him, Draco swiped the pungent salve onto her oozing wound, making sure to cover all ofthe puncture holes in one swipe.

Hermione whimpered as it touched her skin and when it begin to fizz and bubble as it sank through the layer of skin Hermione squeezed his hand, biting down hard on the cushion even was she groaned in agony. Draco wanted to cuddle her, but he knew moving her at all while the stuff was sinking in would just make it more painful. Hermione screamed as the evil substance sank even deeper, but Draco was reassured that it was almost over. As soon as it stopped bubbling he watched the way the skin joined together and sealed over in a shiny pink scar on her shoulder.

"Is it over?" Hermione whispered when Draco pulled her into his lap and cuddle her close.

"Yes, it's sealed and done. You're marked as mine Hermione Granger, even if no one else will ever recognise that it's my mark, you're permanently marked as the property of Draco Malfoy." Draco was aware of the smugness in his voice and she pinched him for sounding so thrilled but he couldn't keep from laughing.

"And you, Draco Malfoy are permanently marked as property of Hermione Granger. You're mine and all those other pureblood tarts had better keep their paws off you or they'll find themselves in the Hospital Wing." Hermione said right back to him. Draco felt surprise flit through him to hear her speak so darkly and so fiercely.

It wasn't the first time she had surprised him these holidays. Draco had learned that there was a whole lot more to Hermione Granger than the goody-two-shoes, rule-following, know-it-all girl she was at school. He'd already known that she was a wanton vixen from the erotic novels she so often indulged in, but he'd been pleased and surprised to learn how self-confident she was, how she was proud of how she looked. He liked the way she never tried to hide from his view, even when she was stark naked. He'd also learned that she was incredibly gifted at playing the piano when he'd found her in the living room after he'd showered. She was also a decent singer. More than once he'd walked in to find her at her piano singing and playing. When he'd first caught her she had reacted the same way she had to being naked in front of him, not at all seeming to care what he might think of her voice or her playing.

Draco loved that she was so confident and loved that she trusted him so much, even though he'd never given her cause to. He'd discovered that she loved to watch movies almost as much as she loved books and she had admitted that before she went to Hogwarts she hadn't been as much of a know-it-all because the reading she so often did was used to occupy her mind the same way television did when she was at home. He'd learned that her favourite time of the year was Christmas time and she had insisted they decorate the house with all the Christmas season traditions, including mistletoe and holly, in such an innocent childlike way that he hadn't been able to resist her pleadings.

He'd also discovered a darker side to Hermione. He learned that she often preferred her books to the company of others, and that she had very little tolerance for girls as friends because of their frivolous, petty interests. When Draco had questioned her about her friendship with the Weaslette, Hermione had admitted that Ginny was so much a tom-boy because she had six brothers that at times Ginny was like a boy anyway. He'd also found it incredibly endearing when Hermione had taken him ice skating in muggle London. A group of muggle girls had been eyeing him and giggling, obviously intrigued by him. Draco hadn't been able to keep from laughing when Hermione had expressed a jealous streak he hadn't expected from her. She skated right up to him on the ice and snogged him senseless, making him wish they were back at home so he could have his wicked way with her.

"So… are you sleepy?" Hermione asked him softly, snuggled up on his lap, distracting him from his thoughts.

"Not really" Draco admitted, wondering what prompted the question.

"Since it's our last night here, how would you feel about curling up on the rug in front of the fire, putting on a video and making love for the rest of the night?" Hermione asked impishly.

Draco started to laugh even as lust flared to life inside him again. "Mon Amour, you are without a doubt, my favourite witch in the whole world."

Draco laughed even harder when Hermione rubbed the tip of her nose against his and said "I know."


	10. Fern

**Fern**

**Draco **felt his head snap up in surprise when he heard the sinister voice of his godfather hissing at him out of the darkness within the dimly lit potions classroom.

"Mr Malfoy, see me after class."

Draco raised his eyebrows while Snape glared at him over the top of his cauldron. The bell would ring in about five minutes and like everyone else Draco had yet to finish his potion, let alone begin cleaning anything up. Even Hermione was still fussing over her potion.

"Everybody else, begin to put you things away. Your potions will brew overnight and tomorrow we will discover who among you is likely to fail their O.W.L.s, though the answer to such is already blatantly obvious." Draco felt his eyebrows rise even higher at the hissing, angry tone of Snape's voice.

Normally he sounded sarcastic and disdainful but today he sounded downright out of sorts. Draco wondered what he could possibly have done that would result in Snape calling out that he stay behind after class in front of everyone. Waving his wand over his potion making equipment Draco cleaned and sorted everything before scooping up the ingredients he taken from the cupboard and carrying the jars back to the supply closet. He caught Hermione's eye as he went past and she eyed him curiously. Draco realised she was curious as to what he could possibly have done the irk Snape on their first day back but as he walked past her, Draco suddenly cared a little less about whatever Snape's problem was because his nose was assaulted by the scent of her perfume and he suddenly found himself wallowing within his own mind, dwelling within the memory of their final night as they made love again and again and again into the wee hours of the morning before falling into an exhausted sleep.

Hermione had laughed about the carpet burn she'd discovered on her knees yesterday morning from the rug they lain on and Draco had found himself turned on all over again to think of how it felt to have her riding him slow and easy. Draco stumbled over Potter's bag on his way to the cupboard and cursed himself for letting his mind wander in this of all classes. He couldn't afford to let himself be distracted by memories of the way it felt to have Hermione writhing beneath him. Not in front of Snape, who would report straight to his father if he even suspected there was anything illicit going on between Draco and anyone who wasn't a pureblood.

As he was leaving the supply closet the Weasel King shoulder-barged him and Draco reacted without thinking or taking into account that as a Keeper, Weasley was of a much more solid build than his own lean seeker's build. He caught hold of the front of Weasley's shirt, pissed off already for his own clumsiness and his Godfather's interest in him, not to mention he'd seen Weasley fighting with Hermione this morning and had heard him say some cutting things.

"Watch where you're going Weasley or everyone else might have to watch their step to keep from tripping over your useless corpse!" Draco growled into the ginger's angry, startled face. Before Snape or anyone else could even think of intervening Draco threw the ginger haired prat away from himself, shoving the witless bastard out of his way and stalking across the dungeon to pack all of his things back into his bag and throw himself down onto his stool to wait and find out what his godfather could possibly want with him.

Potter and Weasley were both glaring at him across the dungeon when he next looked up and Draco flipped them off, smirking cruelly to rub in the fact that he'd gotten away with attacking Weasel King. Hermione caught his eye as he was about to look away and he could tell she was confused and a little mad at him for attacking her friend even if the git had started a fight with her that morning but Draco just rolled his eyes and pretended to curl his lip in disgust, aware that Snape was watching him closely even though he didn't appear to be.

When the bell rang everyone else got up and started to file out of the dungeons, including Hermione even though her bone-headed best friends tried to linger to find out what Snape wanted with him. When they finally left the classroom, Snape waved his wand and the door slammed closed with a bang. Draco knew it was locked and he watched Snape wave his wand some more, no doubt putting silencing charms everywhere and making sure they wouldn't be overheard or interrupted. Draco lounged on his stool, looking the picture of ease and deciding he didn't really give a damn what his godfather wanted with him, not when he was at war within himself because he felt amazing after the holidays he'd spent with Hermione, and furious with having to pretend for everyone that he was a complete tosser who wasn't in love with Hermione.

"You've been lying Draco." Snape accused him from across the room as he glided closer, looking more like a giant bat than ever.

"Have I?" Draco drawled at him "Funny accusation from the biggest liar of all. Tell me, how do you lie to Dumbledore so efficiently and never get caught?"

"Careful Draco… or the lies I told Lucius on your behalf might suddenly slip my mind." Snape hissed at him threateningly. Draco felt his stomach drop at the mention of his father but didn't let his smirk slip off his face. "It seems you were at Hogwarts this Christmas" Snape continued and Draco knew that Snape had in fact caught him in a lie "At least that is according to Lucius. Yet I was here all Christmas and I distinctly remember watching you board the train for King's Cross. So how is it that you parents think you were at Hogwarts and Hogwarts thinks yow went home, yet you were neither place Draco?"

Draco stared into the fathomless black eyes of his godfather, thoughts of his holidays swirling in his mind. He didn't have an adequate lie to tell Snape that would explain a two week absence, and he definitely didn't have an excuse to explain why he would ever lie to his parents about his whereabouts since family always came first with Purebloods. When he stayed silent Snape's lip began to curl.

"You're going to have to do a little better than that if I'm to lie to my best friend for you Draco" Snape hissed "Lucius would be less than pleased to learn that you'd lied to him. As it is, he is suspicious. Rumour has reached him of you catching the Knight Bus into the heart of muggle London. The only thing that stopped him from storming the school, as he has in the past, was my lie to him that you and I spent Christmas drinking butterbeer and firewhiskey, while delving into dark curses. Now explain to me why I had to tell this lie Draco."

"Is it really important?" Draco asked quietly, fear attempting to slip the leash he kept it on and run free within him. Snape's glare told him that those words were the wrong thing to bring to their little conversation.

"You are digging yourself a hole Draco, and if I'm to help you out of it and confiscate your shovel, you'd best give me some incentive as to why I'm lying for you."

"What do you want me to say?" Draco demanded "I didn't go home like I told my friends, and I didn't stay here like I told Father. Is it important that I was neither place or is it important that I live long enough to lie about it some more?"

Snape glared at him for a long time and Draco fought to urge to squirm in his seat.

"You will be coming to see me two nights a week on the days you don't have prefect duty then Draco." Snape said shortly.

"No I won't" Draco countered.

Snape's eyes flashed warningly "Tell me Draco; how long do you think it will take the Dark Lord to penetrate your mind and learn what you've been doing?"

The words hung in the air and for just a moment Draco wondered if his godfather could somehow know the truth.

"You are rostered to work with Miss Granger again this term, both in your classes and your prefect duties." Snape suddenly changed the subject and Draco felt himself losing his foothold on the conversation.

"I thought they were supposed to rotate the roster of prefects this term" He pretended to whine.

"They did" Snape snapped at him.

"Then why am I still paired with Granger?"

"Professor Dumbledore seems to think that Miss Granger will have a positive influence on you, since his plan for the entire student body is to strengthen bonds and form friendships in these troubled times" Snape replied, his beady black eyes glaring down at Draco as though seeing into his very soul. "Tell me Draco; how do you feel about a bond forming between yourself and Miss Granger?" he hissed suddenly and Draco knew he'd been brought undone by his lack of tantrum at being rostered to work with her again this term.

"She's a mudblood" Draco sniffed disdainfully.

Snape glared some more "That's right Draco. She's a mudblood. Yet for all her filth you have trouble resisting the urge to laugh when she whispers things to you in class. Tell me, if a bond with a mudblood is not being achieved here, why would Hermione Granger be whispering anything to you that wasn't snide insults?" his voice was deadly soft and Draco felt real fear curl in the pit of his stomach.

Snape knew.

He must know. Why else would he ask these questions? He was going to rat Draco out to his father and if Lucius didn't kill Draco, the Dark Lord would.

"Draco, you can tell me where you have been these past two weeks… or I can take the information right out of your head just the same way the Dark Lord or Lucius will." Snape threatened him darkly and Draco lifted his chin, getting to his feet to glare at his godfather even as he forcibly shoved anything and everything that had to do with Hermione or with Nobba's murder and any of the other secrets he'd been sitting on into the vault within his mind before he proceeded to crumble everything around it, conjuring up images of nothing but destruction and rubble all tucked behind a shield at steel.

"Go ahead and try" Draco hissed back at him. He didn't have time to gasp before Snape raised his wand and hissed "Legilimens!"

Draco could feel Snape trying to penetrate his mind, and he felt his body begin to shake with exertion when Snape exploded the shield within his mind. Amongst the rubble Snape found many things, images of Draco's childhood; playing in Mother's garden, exploring the deepest darkest recesses of the Manor, he even found some memories of Lucius being displeased with Draco and reacting accordingly. Draco began to pant as Snape watched the memory of him being beaten in his second year when he had besmirched the Malfoy name by losing to Potter at Quidditch in spite of the new brooms Father had bought for the entire team.

Draco felt Snape digging deeper and he gritted his teeth as Snape poked at some more of the rubble, trying to uncover the secrets hidden within.

"You're wasting your time. You won't find it" Draco told him, shoving Snape out of his mind. Snape glared at him for a moment.

"Won't I?" Snape hissed "The mistake you make is in thinking that the Dark Lord or Lucius will only search your mind once. With every entry they glean more information about where to push to dismantle your shields. Legilimens!"

Draco hissed as Snape entered his mind again, this time poking harder at the rubble, uncovering memories of Draco playing with Paski and Nobba as a child, of the wonder he had felt when Paski had let him hold the elflet she had birthed. It felt strange for Draco to suddenly think of the elf Dobby, who had so longed for freedom and now worked here at Hogwarts, as just a little elflet.

"How touching" Snape hissed inside his mind and from in front of him. Draco tightened his mind forcing the man out again.

"The mistake you are making is in believing I'm unwillingly letting you in, just to show you that you'll never find the truth inside my mind. I can keep you out completely if I choose." Draco said smugly.

"Ah but if you completely keep out the Dark Lord or Lucius they will know you are hiding something and torture you until you let them enter or go mad." Snape told him "Your father suspects something Draco. He doesn't entirely believe me that you were at Hogwarts because of the rumour that reached him of you riding the Knight Bus. What were you doing in Muggle London Draco? Legilimens!"

Draco hissed, realising Snape had been trying to distract him in order to glean more information from within his mind. Draco cursed out loud when Sane seized onto the memory of Draco curling his lip in disdain at the driver and the attendant on the Knight Bus and he gritted his teeth as Snape watched him by a ticket to Trafalgar Square. Draco forced him out before he could follow the memory any further.

Snape stood before him, curling his lip in disdain.

"Trafalgar Square? Who might you be meeting in the heart of Muggle London Draco?" Snape hissed. Draco felt his mind tighten in preparation for the next attack only to be completely floored by Snape's next words "What is Hermione Granger to you?"

Draco's mind quivered as Snape forced his way back in and this time Draco gave up all distraction and rubble, presenting instead only Snape standing in a stark white room while his question about Hermione hung in the air, repeating itself over and over again. For a moment Snape seemed to do nothing and Draco tensed, waiting to see what the man would do, finding that he was unable to push him out while Hermione's name kept resounding in his head. Snape seemed to wander around inside the room and when the words repeated again Draco felt something inside his mind give way as the white room exploded and Snape latched onto Hermione's name to follow it wherever Draco's mind would take it.

Draco gasped when he felt his knees hit the floor of the cold dungeon while Snape came across childhood memories of Granger. It began at the first time he'd ever laid eyes on her and Draco was surprised to learn the memory was even in his mind. She stood in the doorway of their compartment on the Hogwarts Express, already dressed in her black school robes, her bushy hair wilder than ever and those big buck teeth he used to tease her for on display as she asked them something about a toad. In the next memory of her Snape and Draco both watched her at their Sorting, watching the Hat place her in Gryffindor. Draco tried to redirect the line of memories, to flood his mind with memories of his own sorting, and Goyle's and Crabbe's and even Potter's but Snape deflected each one having seized tightly to Hermione's name and pushing it around inside Draco's head to see what he could uncover.

Draco wanted to scream when more memories of Hermione that he didn't even know he had, began to roll out like the muggle films he'd watched with her over Christmas. The detention in the forbidden forest in first year, her glaring at him for making fun of Potter or Weasley. Those were the most common memories and in each one they grew older. Draco wondered how he had managed to miss locking up the memory of her punching him in the face in third year. On and on they went, Draco finding her in many more of his memories than he suspected because she was always there in the background when he picked fights with Potter or the Weasel, suddenly bought into sharp focus as Snape examined each memory with her at the centre instead of Potter or anybody else.

So far Snape had found nothing in Draco's mind to incriminate himself or Hermione, but Draco could feel him nudging at the edges of each memory, searching for some indication that all was not what it seemed. Finally the film roll of memories came to an abrupt stop and Draco smirked as Snape went back to the last memory of Hermione he could access, watching Draco hit her with the jinx that had caused her teeth expand so rapidly. Snape jabbed at it hard and Draco felt sweat break out on his forehead as his Godfather pushed at every corner of his mind, still clutching onto Hermione's name to drag up anything and everything he could find that in any way related to Hermione Granger.

The bite of the concrete against his knees was almost enough to distract him completely and throw Snape out of his mind, but just as Draco summoned the mental power to force the man out, Snape used Hermione's name like a dagger, breaking through everything else inside his mind and forcing the mental pathways linked to her name wide open. The last thing Draco remembered was an image of Snape inside his mind, standing outside the locked vault that Draco had forced anything and everything relating to Hermione into, Snape was pounding on the metal door to the mental vault when Draco's subconscious mind took over in an attempt to protect them and completely blacked everything out, knocking Draco unconscious.

Draco felt groggy and had a massive headache when he woke up. He was slumped on the couch inside Snape's office and Snape was at his desk fingers pressed to his temples and eyes closed as though he too had a headache. Fear and anger had Draco snapping awake and leaping to his feet as he suddenly remembered that Snape had been prodding around inside his mind and had found the vault full of everything concerning Hermione.

"What did you do?" Draco growled, stalking towards Snape's desk as he pulled out his wand and trained it on his Godfather's face. "What did you learn?"

Snape's eyes snapped open, regarding him coolly.

"Lower you wand Draco, and don't yell so…. It seems that your secrets are guarded well. I know nothing more than that there is an impenetrable vault within your mind that is triggered by digging hard along the lines of Miss Granger. That in itself gives much away, but even with the right tools your mind seeks to protect whatever you are hiding that concerns her. Studying your behaviour around her as I have been, I suspect I know exactly what is locked inside that vault, but even your subconscious will not allow anyone but you to enter it. I also learned that when inside the mind of a victim who has their mind so well protected that unconsciousness is preferable to learning the truths hidden within, voluntary unconsciousness is problematic. I was trapped inside your mind, hence your headache as I had to fight my way out else I would succumb to unconsciousness myself."

Draco stared at the man who had all but told him that he knew there was a vault of secrets inside Draco's mind filled with secrets that pertained in some form to Hermione Granger. Snape knew now. He didn't know everything, but he knew enough to suspect the truth of his whereabouts these past holidays. Fear and resignation swirled in the pit of Draco's stomach as he dropped heavily into the wooden chair in front of Snape's desk and pocketed his wand.

"You did well to resist, and you're mind is truly impenetrable. However, had you not passed out I would have gained entrance to that vault. I would hope that you have more security within your mind than just one vault filled with every secret and memory you have buried inside." Snape didn't seem at all surprised or concerned that he had just learned his pureblood godson had a whole vault of secrets locked away concerning a mudblood.

"Each memory is separated inside the vault, each secret hidden inside a box among thousands of empty boxes. My mind would shut down before even one of the memories or secrets could be found. Had you gotten past the first door to the vault there are several more, then millions upon millions of boxes. Some contain memories, other secrets, even more have nothing at all. The most important secrets are buried even deeper. One box amid the millions leads you deeper and there you die because my mind destroys yours as the boxes are replaced by pissed off snakes. You die in their coils while they sink their fangs into you. Your mind is poisoned with nothing but darkness and the most evil of curses and spells before you can reach the final secrets." Draco told his godfather tiredly.

Snape stared at him for a long time and Draco felt himself smirk just a little bit at the shock and grudging respect in Snape's eyes to learn the true extent Draco had gone to in order to protect himself and Hermione.

"Impressive" Snape sneered at him, but Draco knew it was actually a compliment "But what is it that needs such extensive protection? You must fear terribly for you own life to bury anything that deeply."

Draco stared at his godfather for a long time. "Buried that deep are things more important than my life." He said finally. After all, the man seemed to know about his romance with Hermione, or at the very least suspect that there was more than tolerance, more even than respect for each other, between the two of them.

Snape's eyebrows rose slowly until they disappeared into his greasy black hair. Draco leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees and hung his hands between them. He looked down, away from his godfather's shocked face.

"My, my Draco" Snape hissed sneeringly "It seems you've done a lot of growing up when no one was looking. I never thought I'd see the day where you would admit that anything was more important than you own life. Miss Granger has been busy." He spoke condescendingly and Draco slowly lifted his head to meet his godfather's eyes.

"I don't see you leaping for the Floo Network to inform Father about any of this. Aren't you worried for your own life?" Draco countered, familiar with this deadly game of pushing truths from others. Draco was surprised when Snape started to laugh and he realised that this was the first time he had ever heard the man genuinely laugh. There was no sneer or taunt in his laughter, nor the forced sound Draco had often heard him use at the Manor. Instead genuine laughter spilled from Snape's mouth and it reshaped his cruel, hook nosed face into something almost friendly.

"Draco my life was forfeit long ago" Snape told him, still chuckling "Because much like you I let a mudblood get inside my head. I let her into my heart too, though she wanted no place there. It would seem you are far more like me than like Lucius." Snape chuckled derisively "He would have us both whipped to know it."

Draco stared in shock at his godfather to hear him admit anything about himself. It made him wary since admitting truths was not a common practice among Slytherins. Draco was surprised to learn Snape had ever loved a Mudblood but he suddenly recalled a rumour of Snape once upon a time begging the Dark Lord to spare the life of Lily Evans. Potter's mother. She was a mudblood and suddenly Draco understood so much more about his godfather's hatred of Potter.

"So what are you going to do Mr Malfoy?" Snape asked of him "It seems your mind has protected Granger very well, but anyone who has observed you when she is around or when you are paired together in classes could reach the same conclusions that I have. What are you going to do about it?"

"What are you going to do about it?" Draco countered, aware of what he was admitting but not really caring about that so much as what Snape would do with the information.

"I don't see why anyone needs to know what has or hasn't transpired between you and Granger, Draco. But you must do something. Perhaps you have developed some sort of friendship with her, but you are too obvious with the effects of such a bond. I was looking for it, I have been all year since I caught you staring at her in Potions on the first day of this academic year, perhaps others will be less observant. Other teachers might be surprised but say nothing to see you getting along, but other students are bound to notice and that will get back to your father and the Dark lord. They'll brand you a mudblood sympathiser and Lucius will unleash a new kind of punishment at such weakness and public humiliation."

"You're not going to tell anyone that Granger and I don't detest one another?" Draco asked incredulously.

"No, and like you I happen to be particularly good at hiding things within my mind. Draco if I'm going to help you lie about this I need more information. I need you to know that lies are most believable when they hold even a skerrick of truth. I need you to tell me where you were these holidays."

"Why? You've already worked it out" Draco growled, uncomfortable admitting anything to his godfather. Uncomfortable admitting anything to anyone who wasn't Hermione.

"You were with Miss Granger?" Snape clarified. Draco just stared at him.

"Interesting… her friends are under the impression that she was skiing with her parents. How long have you and Granger…. How did you put it?... How long have you and Granger not detested each other?"

"Is that important?"

Snape looked amused now and Draco bristled at having him know anything at all. He was seriously considering going for his wand and obliviating his godfather when Snape spoke again.

"What will you do Draco, when the Dark Lord offers you the honour of the Dark Mark? He spoke these holidays of giving you the mark this Summer. What will become of your…. Relationship… with Miss Granger when you take the Dark Mark and have to earn the right to wear it?"

Draco stared at his Godfather some more.

"Exactly how much do you know or suspect of me and Granger?" Draco asked him softly.

"You've broken the pureblood family rule about not lying to one another, Draco how much do you think I know?" Draco kept right on staring at his godfather until Snape kept talking. "Your memories of Granger come to an abrupt halt not long before the Yule Ball last year. Based on that I can glean that something transpired between you that night and has been affecting you since otherwise you wouldn't have locked away every and any memory you have of her after that night. However if I recall correctly, she hated you even more than usual after that particularly evening. This year you've been paired together almost constantly within all of your classes as well as four nights per week worth of Prefect duty. It is not hard to imagine what might have transpired but exactly how far the… shall we say friendship…. Has progressed is something of a mystery. Though you spending your entire Christmas break with her is telling of itself. I suspect her parents wouldn't approve to know you'd spent so much time alone with their daughter, given your past treatment of her. And I recall a snippet of gossip from the Order whilst spying that suggested she was to be skiing with them this Christmas. I take it you've rubbed off on her and she lied to her parents and friends as well?"

Draco gaped at the man realising he might as well have just given him access to all of his memories. Snape chuckled at his expression.

"My, my, Draco. Willing defiling a mudblood. What would Lucius say?" Snape clucked his tongue disapprovingly and Draco felt his cheeks turn a little bit pink.

"What are you going to do with the information?" Draco demanded, fear once again curling in the pit of his stomach.

"Suggest that you speak to Granger and let her know that interaction between you and her is being monitored, that your actions have been called into question, while I try to diffuse the situation and convince Lucius that Stan Shunpike is a lying buffoon and that you were with me over Christmas. What are you going to do about her when you have to take the mark? If you try to run or betray your family and the Dark Lord they will kill your mother and then hunt you down."

Draco eyed his godfather for a long time in silence, trying to work out why he would help Draco lie to his parents and friends and everyone else in the world about his relationship with a mudblood.

"Hermione knows everything, though I thought I'd at least finish school before I would have to take the mark." Draco began tiredly "She understands everything, that I'll have to walk away to save myself and my family from torture and death." Snape looked surprised to hear this and Draco gave him a bitter smirk. "I might be an idiot for even looking sideways at her, but we are talking about the two smartest fifth years here. Hermione and I both understand the risks and we decided a little time was worth taking them."

"And if you someday have to kill her best friends?" Snape asked bluntly.

Draco laughed humourlessly "We both know that I'll never be able to kill anyone. I don't believe anymore. I'll pretend, but if I have to kill someone I'll fail."

Snape nodded slowly and Draco realised that his godfather saw more than Draco had ever suspected if he knew Draco didn't have it in him to kill anyone.

"The Dark lord will ask it of you. You'll have to make it look like you at least tried if you want to escape with your life." He warned and Draco nodded.

"Why are you asking me any of this? Why are you keeping my secrets?" Draco asked quietly. This time it was Snape who watched for a long time before replying.

"I told you that you are more like me than Lucius…." Snape began, a faraway look coming into his eyes. "When I was you age I was pulled into the Dark Arts because I was good at them and because I was in Slytherin. I didn't have family involved with the Dark Lord, but I was drawn in by the older students, by the power I could gain by aligning myself with Dark magic and evil people. I was also best friends with a mudblood Gryffindor and had been even before we both came to Hogwarts. I missed my chance with her because of my association with the Dark Arts and my hatred and jealousy of others who admired her." Snape looked down at his desk "She died at the Dark Lord's hand and if you and Miss Granger are discovered I have no doubt she will befall the same fate, especially given her association with Potter… I suppose I don't want to see you end up like me Draco."

Draco had never heard anyone but Hermione be so honest with him in all his life and her stared in open-mouthed surprise to hear his godfather admit that

"If the Dark Lord killed this girl you cared so much for… How can you follow him so faithfully?" Draco murmured, wondering how he would cope with the even the idea of losing Hermione to the will of the Dark Lord. Draco knew he wouldn't handle it. He would go mad and murder anyone who stood between him and the Dark Lord, probably ending up dead himself. How could Snape live knowing that the woman he loved was murdered by the man he followed so faithfully?

"Lily walked away from me when I accidently called her a mudblood…. But the real question Draco, is how does one fall for a girl who lives and walks in the Light, without losing ones own Darkness?"


	11. Snapdragons

_**Snapdragons**_

**Hermione** looked across the Great Hall as lunch began to come to an end, wondering what could possibly be happening with Draco that had kept him out of the rest of this morning's lessons. There was a big part of her that was worried that Snape had somehow found out about them or that he suspected something. Another part of her wanted to reason that while Professor Snape wasn't the nicest of people, he was on the Order, and therefore trustworthy enough that he wasn't likely to murder Draco if he did learn that Hermione and Draco weren't exactly enemies anymore.

But another part of Hermione was worried that Professor Snape had needed to pass on some vital information to Draco about his family or something as equally troubling. It disturbed her that Draco hadn't been around all morning, especially after he'd been in such a bad mood during Potions. It had been unexpected to see him grab the front of Ron's shirt and stand nose to nose with him before violently throwing Ron away from himself. Hermione had nearly choked on her own tongue when Ron and told her and Harry what Malfoy had said to him.

Hermione wasn't entirely sure she believed Ron, simply because it seemed so out of character for Draco after the two weeks they had spent together at her house in London. But Hermione supposed that he would've been angry at being called out to stay after class in front of everyone, and then he had tripped on his way to the supplies cupboard. It wasn't entirely surprising that he would take his anger and irritation out on Ron who had rammed into Draco with his shoulder, but it was strange for him to have been so physically confrontational.

Draco wasn't exactly one for muggle brawling, as had been proven when Harry and the Weasley twins had attacked him for his comments about both of their mother's. Draco was known for starting duels and purposely inconveniencing both Harry and Ron, as well as Hermione at times in order to keep people from suspecting anything. But to confront Ron so rudely and say such sinister things in a classroom during a lesson… Hermione was definitely worried. She had tried to understand what was wrong with him as he'd sat back down before the bell but he had just curled his lip and rolled his eyes at her because Harry and Ron had been watching.

_Where are you Draco? _Hermione thought to herself as she pressed her fingers against the teeth mark shaped scar on her shoulder.

**Draco **stumbled as he made his way towards the Great Hall to get some lunch, when he suddenly felt the niggling fuzziness that accompanied Hermione pressing on the mark he had left on her neck, combined with an image of Hermione who was in the Great Hall and looking particularly worried. The image itself wasn't what made him stumble though. Draco found himself stumbling because even as he saw the picture of Hermione inside his mind, he could swear that he'd just heard her voice inside his head, asking him where he was. Draco shook himself as he straightened his shoulders. He must be imagining things. Maybe the image of her looking so worried had triggered the familiar sound of her voice in his head since he had talked to no one but her for the last two weeks until yesterday. After all, he had just spent the better part of three hours with Professor Snape rummaging around inside his head, specifically seeking out anything and everything about Hermione Granger.

He'd had a long chat with his godfather, ensuring that Snape wasn't going to run off and out Draco to Lucius or the Dark Lord. Snape had several suggestions concerning making sure that they could never be found out and while Draco had proved to Snape that any memory he had of Hermione that portrayed him or her in any way that shouldn't be happening was inaccessible, Snape had been able to offer him some ideas on making sure that no suspicion at all about Hermione could be drawn from his mind.

Snape had shown him how to create a false memory, allowing anyone who might dip into his mind specifically looking for anything to do with Hermione, a more legitimate series of events concerning his girlfriend. He'd learned to create the false memory, portraying nothing but loathing and repugnance between himself and Hermione, knowing that anyone who looked, as Snape had, would draw conclusions at any and all memory of Hermione Granger suddenly disappearing from his mind. The false trail was easy to follow and often portrayed Hermione as a background figure of little interest rather than the main focus. In many he simply had to change the colour of his interest in her.

All memory he had of her since the Yule Ball when they had kissed for the very first time, had been coloured with curiosity and desire aimed at Hermione. Often they occurred amid some other memory as Draco started arguments or duels with Potter and the Weasel, so Draco simply had to let them out and alter them, painting Hermione as nothing worth his notice. Snape had tested his work after the first one, doing the same thing he had done as he'd searched for the information inside Draco's mind the first time. He'd examined the memory and found it completely flawless, even when focused on Hermione.

Draco felt a little smug that Snape had given him a round-about compliment at having created the false memories so successfully. He'd told Draco that since he knew there was in fact something between Draco and Granger to look for, it made it all the more impressive that any representation of her was completely negative. He'd also been impressed by Draco's ability to make Hermione seem a little fuzzy within the memories, as though he hadn't actually noticed her there at the time because she meant less than nothing and was far beneath his nose.

All in all Draco was feeling good about the morning, even if his godfather had learned the truth. Snape had made several other suggestions about making sure Hermione had the same, if not a higher level of protection within her mind. If anyone were to use the Legilimens spell on her, they would possibly come across all the information Draco had hidden so well within his mind and completely void the work he had done. Draco was determined to keep that from happening because most of Hermione's memories for him would either be of hating him, or of wanting him and feeling things for him that a mudblood had not right to feel. At least that would be how his father would see it. A mudblood lusting after a pureblood and even falling in love with a pureblood would be acceptable to his father, because his father believed Purebloods ought to be worshipped and adored. Such an occurrence would be unsurprising, but digging deeper in Hermione's mind they would undoubtedly find memories of the two of them kissing and touching and even making love. Snape had warned him that he would send a message to Hermione at the end of the week with the intention of undergoing the same series of mental tests, and to make sure Hermione was prepared for the onslaught within her mind.

When Draco swaggered into the Great Hall, he made sure to keep his eyes schooled away from his girlfriend and away from everything that could be construed as an interest in anything that wasn't Slytherin related. He let his lip curl into a feral smirk as he took his seat between Crabbe and Goyle.

"What did Snape want with you?" Crabbe grunted at him despite his mouth being full of food. Draco piled his plate with some lunch before he deigned to answer.

"He had some good news to pass along to me from father" Draco drawled, having been coached by Snape to supply just such an excuse to his curious friends when they inquired about his absence from the morning's lessons. Snape had also waved away worry about his teachers throwing tantrums at him for not having been in class and had told him he would write each professor a note excusing him. Draco would have to get a copy of the day's homework load of Hermione since he was certain his troll headed sidekicks wouldn't have had the presence of mind to keep from drooling like Neanderthals long enough in order to take note of the day's class or homework schedule.

"It seems there's been a… er…. Shall we say 'recovery mission'…. Of some of His greatest followers" Draco continued, lowering his voice so that only Crabbe and Goyle would hear him. After all, he didn't want to be hauled in for some kind of questioning about knowing these kinds of things before they'd been announced in the Daily Prophet. Crabbe and Goyle both looked like they had no idea what he could possibly mean and Draco had to remind himself that he was no longer in the company of his favourite and cleverest witch, but in the company of those with few more brain cells than a chimpanzee. Draco rolled his eyes.

"Mass Breakout from Azkaban" he said, simplifying the information so that they could understand "Some of the Dark Lord's best and most loyal followers. All of them Sworn and Marked." Draco added, knowing that he was supposed to sound in awe of such a thing. The faces of Crabbe and Goyle lit up with real pleasure and Draco wondered how they could such idiots as to swallow all the bollocks about Purebloods being so much better than everyone else. He may have once believed, but Draco knew that even when he had, he'd also been willing to acknowledge that in their quest for power, many purebloods had committed heinous acts in the name of supremacy. By all accounts, the pureblood families were rotten to the core and even those born into those families knew it.

Draco knew it. Pansy Parkinson knew it. Maybe even Crabbe and Goyle knew it. But before their opinions of their family could be called into question, pureblood children had the motto "Family First" shoved so far down their throats that by the time they were of age to attend Hogwarts, the rot had already infiltrated their minds and begun to consume their very souls. Draco wondered if his own mind was rotted and whether or not Hermione had gotten to him in time to remove the tumour of growth that the Dark Lord and Pureblood Mania had set into motion. A part of him wanted to look over at Hermione and see what she was making if him ignoring her so blatantly.

It had become habit between them to always acknowledge the presence of the other, even if only through a glance across the crowded Hall. Draco smirked wickedly, knowing Hermione was going to chew him out on patrol tonight. She was probably furious at him for the things he'd said to the Weasel in Potions, not to mention the way he'd curled his lip at her and rolled his eyes en she'd tried to find out what was wrong with him. A twisted little part of him revelled in the knowledge, liking the way her eyes snapped fire and her wild hair seemed to crackle with electricity when she got really riled up at him. Draco knew a part of it was because of the way she expressed emotion at all, so unlike any other person in his world. Even his mother was refined and much too dignified to allow herself an outburst that might be used against her in some way.

Another part of his enjoyment when Hermione went barmy at him for something was because she did it so fiercely. Draco liked the way she was utterly unafraid and less than impressed, let along intimidated, by his dangerous reputation. He chuckled darkly when he felt the fuzziness again and hoped his friends wouldn't suspect his laughter had anything to do with Hermione but instead that he was pleased at the idea of so many of the Dark Lords followers about to break out of Azkaban. Instead Draco chuckled as an image of Hermione appeared in his mind. He could already feel her glaring at him, but the image of her made him laugh all the more. She was scowling fiercely, glaring at him in frustration. Her loose hair fell forward to frame her pretty face and Draco savoured the image before he started to choke on his pumpkin juice.

He could swear Hermione had just screamed at him across the hall.

"_WHY ARE YOU IGNORING ME_?!" her voice was so loud that Draco looked up in surprise to meet her narrowed brown eyes but when he did he realised she hadn't even opened her mouth. Instead she still had her fingers pressed firmly against the scar on her neck. Draco raised his eyebrows for a moment, before he narrowed his gaze at her.

Could it be that she was somehow communicating with him telepathically? Draco stared at her for another minute before he looked away from her, trying to recall everything he'd ever read about bonds like theirs. He'd never read anything about telepathy, only that images of each other could be projected. With dark magic the dark Lord was able to make the Dark Mark burn when he touched his finger to one, calling to all of his followers and keeping them in line through the pain he sent surging through them. Was there some way they could possibly have developed a telepathic connection?

Draco knew that Vampires had the ability to communicate telepathically with each other, as well as with any victim they'd ever taken blood from. He also knew that some species of Fairy were able to communicate telepathically, though they were not native to Scotland or anywhere within the British Isles. He'd never heard of Wizards being able to do it without invoking a spell. Could Hermione be using a spell? It was old magic, locked away where students couldn't find it since telepathy was incredibly dangerous. If you didn't know the owner of the voice speaking inside your head, you could for example, become convinced that you had gone insane or you might become convinced that it was the voice of your conscience and allow yourself to commit heinous acts or even just embarrassing ones. Draco knew any textbooks that contained that kind of information would not be kept even in the school library because such magic in the hands of students could be used very cruelly indeed.

Thinking hard, Draco could only come back to the bond they had forged magically. Such a bond was unusual, since many preferred to mark each other in a less…. Repugnant way. Draco supposed there was something very Vampiric about having marked each other via bites….. Suddenly Draco realised something. Could it be that the way in which they had formed their bond, so very like vampires, they had forged a telepathic bond the same way a vampire could with a victim? Draco remembered that when he'd bitten Hermione, he had unavoidably swallowed some of her blood since he'd had to bite her hard enough to scar her.

She had probably done the same thing, unaware of it when she'd bitten him in the heat of passion as they'd made love for the first time.

Could it be true? Could they really communicate telepathically or was Draco just imagining the whole thing? Turning to fix his gaze back onto Hermione, Draco reach up and slipped his fingers inside the collar of his shirt, gliding them over to the shiny pink teeth marks she left on him. Hermione wasn't looking at him anymore, having been drawn into conversation with Potter about something. Draco waited until she was finished speaking, not wanting to interrupt her when she was already mad at him.

When she turned back to the last of her lunch, Draco pressed his fingers down on the scar. Hermione looked up at him, directly into his eyes, and Draco could see she was really mad at him. He tried not to smile, knowing it would make her even angrier, but Merlin it was hard! Thinking the words very clearly in his mind, Draco stared at her hard.

"_Hermione? Can you hear me?"_ he sent the words at her telepathically, certain that she would just keep staring at him like she wanted to punch him in the face again as she had done in third year. Instead she raised her eyebrows slightly, staring at him even harder.

"_Hermione? You can hear my voice in your head can't you?"_ he spoke to her, silently as he stared at her intensely. _"Nod if you can hear me, and I'm not crazy."_ Draco watched an evil little smirk slip onto her face as she very slowly shook her head from side to side.

Draco bit his tongue to keep from gasping. They could actually communicate telepathically!

"_You have to press on your scar and think the words at me if you want to insult me Hermione"_ Draco sent to her drolly as he saw her smirk even more and narrow her eyes at him. He watched her reach up and press on her scar, still smirking.

"_What did you do?"_ she sent to him _"This is some spell, isn't it?"_

Draco wanted to chuckle at how intrigued she sounded. Draco shook his head a little, eyes still fixed on her.

"_It's not a spell. I think it's the scars…. You must have been thinking at me really hard earlier wondering where I was, because I thought I heard your voice in my head. Then you started screaming at me, yet I'm the only one who can hear it. I think the vampiric way we forged the bond between us allowed us a telepathic connection."_

"_Telepathy? And all I have to do to reach you is press on my scar and think the words at you"_ Hermione wondered telepathically. Draco smirked at her evilly.

"_So much for us both being able to pay attention in class or focus on studying or anything, eh Granger?"_ Draco murmured to her huskily inside his head _"Not likely when I can watch you blush from here while I make you think about how it felt to writhe beneath me all Christmas."_

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him. _"Draco Malfoy you will not under any circumstances distract me during class with thoughts like that! Unlike you, I'm actually interested in everything I learn in class."_

Draco scoffed at her "_Yeah right Mon Amour, you already know everything before we get to class anyway. You and I both know you could get Os in every subject even if you didn't pay attention for the rest of the year."_

Hermione rolled her eyes and Draco found that speaking to her telepathically was almost as good as standing right beside her and whispering in her ear, especially since they didn't need to worry about being caught. Even if he wasn't looking at her across the hall, he'd be able to see her expression because he also got an image of her inside his mind along with her sweet voice.

"_Where have you been all morning? You missed three lessons."_ She asked him.

"_Snape suspected us. He couldn't get at any memories or thoughts of you, but he knows we're together."_ Draco told her casually. He watched her choke on her sandwich for a minute in surprise.

"_He WHAT?"_ she shrieked inside his head, making Draco wince "_Professor Snape knows we're dating? How can you just be sitting there so calmly? We're done for! Everyone is going to find out and the only thing we'll be able to do is run away to somewhere like Australia where no one knows who we are or that we're breaking all the stereotypes about purebloods and muggle-borns. Oh my gosh, Harry and Ron will murder me! No, even worse, they'll murder you! How can you be so bloody calm about this? Snape knows! Snape! He'd love to hurt Harry and Ron by telling them just to see their faces when they learn I've betrayed them. I might as well march upstairs right now and pack my things…"_

Draco waited for her to stop rambling in a panic before he replied, taking a hefty bite of his pie as he sent the words at her _"Relax Mon Amour, he is sworn to silence. He isn't going to tell anyone, and no one else is going to find out, unless he tells Dumbledore but I doubt he will do that. Oh, and we're rostered on to patrol together again this term apparently. Anyway he knows because he worked out something was wrong when Father asked him about me spending Christmas here, even though I obviously wasn't here since I was with you. He doesn't know everything, but he does know we're dating and have been involved in some way since the Yule Ball. He's more interested in keeping everyone alive that outing us. Namely because he already lied to my father and in spite of Severus's friendship with Father, he's rather fond of his godson and doesn't want to see me dead…. What he does want is to see you, at the end of the week. You need to have learned how to lock away anything about our relationship that might hint at us being anything other than enemies. He'll be testing you, breaking into your mind and searching for anything to do with me, just the way the Dark Lord or my father would if they ever got hold of you."_

Hermione had gone pale _"And here I had just been sympathising with Harry that Occlumency wouldn't be so bad…. You really spent all morning with Snape rummaging around inside your head?"_

**Hermione **was shaking a week later when she walked into Professor Snape's office. She was supposed to be patrolling with Draco tonight, but Snape had ordered the Head boy and Girl to excuse both Hermione and Draco from their duties for the evening.

"Well, well, well" his voice hissed from behind his desk in the dimly lit office. Hermione jumped at the sound. After Draco had told her everything about needing to become skilled at Occlumens, Hermione had realised that it would be useful not just concerning everything about their relationship, but also anything to do with DA and any little piece of information concerning Harry or Ron, or anyone else she loved. Her head was a sponge filled with knowledge that could be used by Legilimens against her. All week Hermione had spent every spare moment learning how to compartmentalize her mind even more than she already did for study, learning to separate emotion from memory and memory from reality and how to hide away memories in order to create false ones.

It had been a trying week, and more than once Hermione had almost been caught by Harry and Ron when she had given them some excuse about studying or patrolling while she met with Draco to practice closing her mind. He happened to be very good at Legilimency himself and Hermione hadn't wanted to go up against Snape unprepared for having her mind penetrated and raided. It had felt strange to allow Draco access to her mind, and she found there was far more hidden away inside that he had been able to unearth, things that she had all but forgotten about or dismissed as being of little use should someone find it within her mind. He'd showed her all the ways such things could be used against her and Hermione had been frightened to learn about the evil ways in which Draco had been taught to think. She'd been appalled when he used a memory he'd found of her saving the life of a rabbit that had been hit by a car to project into her mind all kinds of nightmarish images of animals being tortured and mutilated and slaughtered, and she'd been shocked when he'd stumbled on an innocent conversation between Hermione, Ron and Harry from first year to emotionally manipulate her into the way it would feel had her friends been killed when they had tried to save the Philosopher's Stone.

All week Hermione had dedicated herself to the task, working even harder when she realised that being unable to close her mind and switch off her emotions could lead to the destruction of the entire wizarding world. Draco had been able to wreak havoc with whatever he found and Hermione had realised that while she might have enormous amounts of discipline when it came to studying, she had none when it came to controlling her emotions and thoughts. She had gleaned new understanding into the way Draco was so controlled and cold, having learned how to emotionally close himself off to anything that could be used to manipulate him or influence him.

"Miss Granger" Snape's voice hissed and as Hermione's eyes adjusted to the dim lighting within the dungeon office, she spotted Snape sitting behind his desk, his elbows resting on the desk, palms pressed together and fingers drumming together sinisterly.

"You wanted to see me, Professor?" Hermione said, squaring her shoulders and not letting the horror stories Harry had been telling her about Occlumency with Snape get the better of her. Professor Snape slowly got to his feet as Hermione moved deeper into the room.

"I assume you know why you are here?"

Hermione nodded her head watching her professor warily, almost expecting him to strike without warning.

"Very well then, we shall begin. I assume that after the Headmaster insisted I educate Potter in Occlumency you were unable to restrain yourself from digging through the library for any information you might be able to find on the subject?" Snap clarified as he came around his desk to stand in front of her.

"Yes" Hermione admitted "I understand Legilimency as well, sir."

"Then you do not suffer from any preconceptions that I will simply be opening your mind and reading the way I would a book?" Snape clarified.

"No sir. I'm experienced with the Legilimens spell, how it works and what you will be attempting." Hermione confirmed, hoping that everything she had learned about this branch of magic and everything Draco had been able to teach her about it by using the spell on her would be enough to at least prepare her for what Snape was about to attempt.

Hermione felt nervous. Allowing Draco into her mind was one thing; after all, she trusted him not to be cruel to her and did not mind having him learn her secrets. Having professor Snape attempt the same thing made Hermione feel a little nauseous; she did not want him to think her incompetent and did not relish the idea of him accessing any of her childhood memories or private thoughts.

Snape sneered at her "Let us hope then, that Draco has been more successful in teaching you, than I have been with Mr Potter. Close your mind and attempt to keep me from entering it Miss Granger. Prepare yourself. Legilimens!"

Hermione steeled herself to the attack, clenching her hand around her wand inside the pocket of her robes and clenching her eyes closed in an attempt to keep Professor Snape out of her mind. She had managed it earlier in the evening with Draco, blocking him from entering completely. But as Hermione stood there with her whole body tensed up, she realised that while Draco had a preliminary grasp on Legilimency as a magical form, he was a long way from being a master. She managed to keep Professor Snape out for perhaps twenty second before she felt the nauseating niggle of having another presence inside her mind.

Gritting her teeth even harder, Hermione thought over everything Draco had taught her this week about keeping anything and everything she could from him within her mind, but again she found Draco was not as skilled at Legilimency as Snape was. With ease Snape seemed to peruse her mind, diving through the layers of fog Hermione presented him with. He picked up countless memories of Hermione's childhood though he did not examine them very closely, for which Hermione was grateful. Hermione wondered if he would search for anything relating to Draco and suspected he must be looking for something like that because he dove beneath the childhood memories to her years at Hogwarts.

For a little while he watched memories Hermione had of Draco as a first year, but then he made a mistake. Snape tried to watch a memory in which Draco had been being a nuisance in class, but in doing so, he had entered Hermione's domain. Much like the library, the classroom was one place within which Hermione excelled at controlling her mental facilities. While Snape attempted to view the memory, Hermione used the parts of her mind that were dedicated to study to completely throw the professor from her mind.

When she opened her eyes, Hermione found that she was gripping the back of the hard-backed wooden chair in front of Snape's desk in a white-knuckled hold, but was pleased to see she had managed to maintain her standing position. He stood across the room from her, looking rather disgruntled. When Hermione met his black gaze he clicked his tongue at her disapprovingly.

"Perhaps you are not such a know-it-all afterwards, Miss Granger" he sneered and Hermione felt her cheeks heat up. "However I suspect that is due to inept teaching. Draco is not as skilled at Legilimency as I believed, and so you haven't the right building blocks or testing methods. As it is, you did better than Mr Potter, whose mind is absurdly easy to penetrate. You managed to keep me out for almost twenty seconds, and when I did enter, you had preliminary effects in place to confuse me. Being that you are among those who wear their hearts on their sleeves, that makes you better at this, however it makes it that much harder for you to master Occulmency."

Hermione gaped at her potions professor, shocked to hear him say anything that was in the slightest way complimentary.

"As I'm sure you are aware, the study of Occlumency lies in closing the mind and emptying it of all emotion. It takes a great amount of control to achieve such… stoicism, especially for someone so used to expressing every tiny emotion. Your shortcomings lie in a lack of self control and a dire need for self discipline concerning your emotions. Now then, while I'm sure Draco has been teaching you that you must simply empty you mind of thoughts and emotions, there is much more to it than that. Now then, another attempt. Focus on emptying you mind and instead of forcing me out, simply allow me access to only the blank page of a book…"

"Why a blank page?" Hermione blurted out, earning herself an irritated glare from Snape.

"The mind is multi dimensional Miss Granger, and unique concerning each individual. We all have our strengths and weaknesses and if you use your strengths during the study of Occlumency, you will be more successful. Your strength, as you have just proved, lies in your knowledge and the rigid discipline you have concerning study and the storage of information. Since your knowledge is learned from books, it is comprehensible that your information must be stored in books."

Hermione didn't quite understand what he was getting at. She understood that knowledge and the storage of it were her strengths, but did not see how a blank page of a book would keep him from penetrating her mind. Snape sighed irritably when he saw her expression.

"Miss Granger, has Mr Malfoy explained to you the ways in which he stores the information he does not wish people to access?"

Hermione shook her head "He said something about a mental vault…."

She watched as Snape walked around and sat back in his chair behind his desk. "Take a seat Miss Granger. I assumed Draco would be better at instructing you in this, but it seems I was wrong to hope." He sneered as he waited for Hermione to slowly sit down, pocketing her wand as she did. "Now then. You need to learn to keep your mind completely impregnable. That is the goal here because once someone has access to you mind, you can be manipulated."

"Draco showed me that" Hermione interrupted again "He did all kinds of things inside my head with innocuous memories or thoughts he managed to find."

Snape looked intrigued for a moment "Then he is skilled at Legilimency, just not in all areas. It takes a great deal of control to seize on the memories or thoughts of another and turn those things against them. The Dark Lord was particularly fond of it, invading the minds of his victims and creating visions designed to torture them into madness. That is why is it so important to keep anyone from entering your mind. If the legilimens is a powerful enough wizard, only entry is necessary. However, those who are less powerful in the art must first happen upon fears or thoughts and then use those things to torture their victims. While in your mind it would've been easy to create visions involving your fear of heights, for example. Therefore, while shielding your mind completely is the goal, there are other measures that can be taken instead. Once inside you mind, I was able to explore with ease, until I stumbled across you in an instant where you were focused on learning. Since that is your strength, you must learn to harness it to keep anyone who does penetrate you mind form gaining access to what they want."

Hermione jumped when someone spoke from behind her.

"I use boxes." Draco Malfoy said "All my memories and thoughts are stored in boxes among billions of empty ones all of which are kept inside vaults, inside rooms."

"So nice of you to finally join us. Do you imagine I have nothing better to do with my time than teaching you and your girlfriend how to clean up the mess you've landed in, Mr Malfoy?" Snape sneered at his godson while Draco strode over and dropped into the empty seat beside Hermione. Draco smirked as though he was amused by the greeting rather than intimidated, but he shook his head.

"No, sir."

"Then perhaps in future you will have the decency to arrive when summoned by a superior in a more timely fashion. Now, as I was saying Miss Granger, inside the mind, you must create an environment you control in order keep me or anyone else from finding information. It is more effective if you use something that lends to your mental disciplines. In your case that would be knowledge. Therefore, instead of boxes like Draco uses, you would do well to store everything inside books."

Hermione started to get it as she thought about the way she already stored useful information inside her mind. She had a tendency to store everything in just that manner; making it so that when she needed to access a particular topic or certain piece of knowledge, she would taken up the book that contained the memory of the topic inside her mind and be able to read the information right off the mental page.

"But doesn't storing everything in books like that make it easier for someone to access?" she asked "When I study potions, anything I learn to do with potions goes inside a big potions book in my head and when I need information on it I go to the chapter and page within the book of information inside my mind. If everything I didn't want people to know was in one big book like that…. then you'd only have to find that book and read it at your leisure."

Draco looked impressed by the way she studied and learned and even Snape raised one eyebrow. Snape seemed to think about what she had said for a moment while Hermione glanced over at Draco. His blonde hair hung down his forehead and into his grey eyes. He was watching her with a little smirk on his face and didn't seem to care at all that Snape sat across the desk from them. He was even wearing one of the pairs of muggle track pants Hermione had bought for him over the holidays and she was surprised to learn that he'd actually left his bedroom suite dressed that way when he was usually so insistent on looking 'proper'.

"Well…." Snape began, and Hermione turned to find him watching them look at each other with a sneer on his face "This might be a little more difficult than we thought" he admitted "The best tactic to keep someone from finding information in your mind is to bury the information amid thousands of empty information storage containers."

"Like I said with the millions of empty boxes. The likelihood of someone finding one of my secrets inside my head is one in ten thousand." Draco cut in. Snape nodded.

"I use potion bottles for mine. Empty ones as well as ones full of true and false memories" Snape told them.

"I don't think that will work for Hermione" Draco stated "Her mind works by filtering information for what is useful and calling on it at will. The mental pathways would be too easy to follow, especially to one big book. Thousands of little ones or empty ones would drive her insane, literally."

Both Snape and Hermione stared at Draco in astonishment.

**Draco **smirked at the pair of them "What?" he shrugged, knowing they were both baffled at him knowing her so well as to understand how her brain functioned, and to admit it so freely.

"So then what do I do instead?" Hermione asked, dismissing her astonishment in favour of learning. Draco smirked as he watched her. Like him she still wore her heavy House cloak, but she wore more comfortable clothing beneath it. She was wearing muggle jeans and a pink knitted jumper and Draco couldn't help but admire how pretty she looked in the dim lighting as she lit up with that familiar passion to learn something new.

Snape was frowning at their words, and Draco knew he'd probably never tried to teach anyone who couldn't separate each piece of information.

"The best way to keep someone from learning things you don't want them to learn is to spread them out."Snape said, "It is too dangerous to store things all in one place. This will take longer than I thought. You, Miss Granger, are going to have to learn how to pull memories out of you knowledge scrap book and store them separately."

Hermione frowned and Draco watched her try to work out how she would go about doing that.

"Start with memories, Hermione" Draco said to her softly, turning away from his godfather to focus entirely on his girlfriend "Start with memories you never want anyone to have access to." Hermione looked up at him, staring into his eyes and Draco could tell she was thinking that the kinds of memories she wouldn't want anyone to find would be memories of being with him. Not because she was ashamed of their relationship, but because it would cost them both too much to be found out.

"Where are they all?" he asked her softly.

"In a book…. Everything in my head goes in books. Those particular memories are in a separate book to everything else though."

"Start there." Draco smiled at her "Pull each memory off the page and conjure up hundred of books instead, all of them empty. Think of them like blank note books. Put a memory in each one and when they are all in separate places, put them all in a giant library filled with books that have real memoires, false memories and nothing at all. Bury them deep Hermione, and with no particular order. Don't try to line them up alphabetically or in particular genres, leave them all scattered all over the place as though a careless little kid has been in that library and pulled all of the books off the shelves and the forgotten them."

They all sat in silence for a while, as Hermione closed her eyes and concentrated on moving her memories around inside her mind. Draco was amused by the way she blushed occasionally and he smirked at his godfather who was still watching the pair of them as though he was intrigued by their relationship.

"Won't this make it so that I have to dig to find my own memories?" Hermione asked after a little while. Draco thought about it. Within his mind, he could recall the memories easily, but he'd disciplined himself to shove them back into boxes when he needed to keep them from people.

"When you study" he began "You store the information in one big book right, with chapters and page numbers and everything so you can pull it up with ease."

Hermione nodded.

"Well, do you have an index somewhere for anything that goes in more than one spot?"

Hermione nodded again "Some information overlaps and has to be stored in two places"

"Then index the information and make sure that the index is kept hidden."

Snape interrupted them then. "Instead of pulling them apart, leave whatever precious memories you never want anyone to find in their little black book and we'll make that the first foundation. The mind is layered, so we will layer it logically when we build defences. Miss Granger, everything you never want anyone to find, put it in a big black book. It will do no good to disturb the way you store the memories, tearing them apart could even damage your mind. Leave them as they are and we will subscribe to Draco's theory. Now, that big black book, once it is full, you will need to put it in a vault. Think of it like the glass display case books are put in, only have it as mirrored glass. Once you have done that we will meet again, however, you will need to work from there, storing memories inside books as you always have, but scattering them in multi-layered libraries within your mind."

Hermione nodded at him.

"Now then" Snape said "For the time being, you can work on that in your own time Miss granger, but I asked both of you here for another purpose." Draco raised his eyebrows at the sinister tone in Snape's voice. "The pair of you will meet with me for one hour on Saturday evenings after ten o'clock for the rest of the year. You will juggle you studies, duties, and personal interests around this appointment."

"Why?" Draco asked, not liking the command. Hermione was frowning as well.

Snape curled his lip at the pair of them "Since the two of you didn't have the sense to keep from forming this dangerous little relationship, precautions must be taken to keep you both from further stupidity."

"I don't understand" Hermione admitted.

"It is painfully obvious to me that the pair of you are enamoured with one another. Since you're supposed to detest each other that presents a problem."

"So why not just order us to stay away from each other?" Draco asked

"You would not listen, and the damage is already done. From what I can see you are obviously a couple and if I'm not mistaken you are more than likely to do stupid things concerning each other because you will let your feelings for each other get in the way of sense."

"You think we're likely to give everything away by reacting to something" Hermione said quietly and Draco looked over at her. She was watching Snape closely and intently, as though he was no longer her professor, but someone who was wrong and needed to be told of it.

"You already have." Snape snapped at them "Do you think the world is blind to the way you whisper to each other and snicker together in your classes? That people would not notice the way you glance at each other or generally get along. You friends might all be too foolish to see through your charades, but others are not. From the start of the year I suspected something between you had changed, and I was right. You must both learn how to control yourselves and keep from being caught. You will learn with me how to be complacent and make it appear tot the world that you do not care for each other."

Draco started to understand what his godfather was getting at. "You want to test us." He murmured. Hermione frowned. Draco looked over at her "This has more to do with the coming war than how we act at school. He wants to test how we will handle it if either of us is tortured before the other."

Snape nodded "Draco has told me you both understand that he will be taking the Dark Mark, which I believe will happen over the summer. When that happens, what will you do? Draco will be expected to prove it Miss Granger, to prove that he is worthy of such a mark and to prove it he must murder someone. How will you cope with him being a murderer? What will you do, Draco, if someday during the coming War, Miss Granger is bought before the Dark Lord or captured and tortured by Death Eaters? They will likely rape her as they torture her before they finally murder her. What will you do? Will you throw away your own life in a vain attempt to save her?"

Hermione and Draco sat silent and stared at him in horror. They had talked about it before. That when the time came they would have to break up, and might even be put in such a situation, but to hear Snape say it, Draco suddenly realised just how deep into trouble he really was. Because he wouldn't be able to stand there and let anyone rape his girl.

"It is January now, and you have until June before you must take the Mark Draco. You know there is no other way, so until then, you will both meet with me. You will both learn complete control, no matter what happens to either of you. I will test you physically and mentally and you will learn how to protect yourselves from detection and how to withstand all but the Killing Curse. You must both consent to this, and I encourage you to think about it this evening and tomorrow. Meet me here tomorrow night if you are willing to learn how to survive the war given what you have both done."

With that Snape waved them towards the door, utterly dismissing them.

Slowly Hermione got to her feet and Draco watched her do it. There was no way he was going to let her go to bed just yet, not after everything she had just heard. He didn't like the sound of having Severus put them though this kind of testing, but he was unsurprised that he would ask it. Just like everything in his life, Draco realised that for the rest of the school year he would be undergoing education that was unpleasant and not at all something he ever wanted to learn, but he knew there would be no way around it.

"What will we be starting with tomorrow night?" Draco ask Snape as he got to his feet.

Snape turned a cold gaze on him, clearly not liking being questioned about it after he had dismissed them. Draco just stared at him waiting for a response. When it became apparent that Snape wasn't going to tell him, Draco narrowed his eyes.

"She's had no training at all and has no idea how to cut off from her emotions of how to lock them down, what are you going to start with so I can teach her the building blocks before you destroy her mind?" Draco demanded in a cold voice.

Snape smirked at him sneeringly and Draco knew that his godfather was enjoying watching how protective Draco had grown for a mudblood whose death he had once hoped for. Glaring at him godfather Draco realised that this was the first lesson and he was failing it by trying to protect her from the unknown and the unexpected but he couldn't quite bring himself to care if he had to fail in order to give her some kind of protection. When Snape finally spoke, his voice dripped with derision.

"You're chivalry is touching" he said sarcastically "But you are not doing her or yourself any favours. Go ahead and try to teach her everything you have learned from Lucius by tomorrow if you think you will be helping her, but you must both learn to be flawless. You must learn how to close off emotionally to anything that I might throw at you. Since you have already been tormenting her with legilimency and warping her memories to use them against her and break down her defense, we will start there, but do not deceive yourselves that your training with me will be arduous and leave you both raw mentally and physically, you will learn what it feels like to be tortured, and how to fight off the Imperius curse, you will learn how it feels to watch someone you care about suffer the same fate and if necessary you will learn the utter pain of losing one another. Professor Dumbledore is now aware of your situation and has agreed that this training will be to the benefit of both you."

Hermione stared at Snape with her mouth open and Draco knew she was having a hard time believing the old wizard who she put her faith in would consent to letting their students suffer for the sake of learning.

"As it is, I will see both of you here tomorrow night at eleven. Be sure you do not incur the notice of any of your peers nor other members of staff."

With that Snape got to his feet and withdrew to his private chambers.

Draco turned to look at Hermione, smiling just a little bit at the way she frowned and worried at her bottom lip with her teeth as she thought over everything she had learned.

"You ok?" Draco asked her softly as he walked towards her. She nodded absently. "Wishing you told me to sod off yet?" Draco asked her, smirking a little to mask his seriousness. After all, being with him demanded a lot more from her than that she just hide it from her friends.

As his girlfriend Hermione had to deal with him being a complete twat to her in public to keep both of their friends from finding out the truth and shunning them. She had to lie to her friends and probably her family. She had to adapt to a life where things were much more sinister than they appeared on the surface and would now have to learn the hard way about the type of lifestyle many of the people Draco was associated with lived. She lied to her friends on a daily basis and had lied to her parents to spend the Christmas with him instead of them. She put up with his friends and even Draco himself bullying her and no doubt hurting her when they bumped into her in the halls and made her drop her things or when they got into duels or arguments. She had to deal with him saying disparaging things to his friends about her that he had no doubt probably made her doubt her own self worth, especially when he had to disdain her in jokes with Pansy.

On more than one occasion Draco knew Hermione had grown incredibly angry with him after he had joked along with Pansy about something Hermione had done. He hated himself for doing it and spent so much time apologizing to her every day for how he was forced to treat her that Draco didn't know how she hadn't told him to sod off yet.

"Not yet" Hermione said, turning to give him a small smile "What did he mean about educating me with the same training you've had. I don't think mentally closing off like you and will work for me. It's not who I am. If we were foisted into a war and you were being tortured, I would do anything I could to try and help you. Even if we hadn't ever become involved like we are and I hated you, I'd try to help you. That's what being a good person means. To overlook the wrongs someone has done to you in order to do the right thing. Not in the sense that certain kinds of society deem it right, but in the sense that there is something inherently important about the sanctity of life and to do anything less than try to save someone, even someone you hate, from an unjust or untimely death makes you as much of a murderer as the person doing the torturing or the killing."

Draco watched the girl he was in love with and realised that for all that she had changed his perspectives and taught him the real right from wrong, that she might be too late. From the cradle Draco had learned that the most important thing in his world should be his own life and doing whatever he had to in order to protect it. Being in love with Hermione had changed that, and he would now willingly defy even his father in order to save her, though he liked to think he would do so in a way that wouldn't wind up with them both dead anyway….. but Draco knew that the Pureblood rot had infected his brain. If it was Potter or Weasley or anyone else who wasn't Hermione or his Mother, Draco knew he would stand idly by even if he disagreed with what might happen to others. In some respects it made him something of a coward, but from birth he had been taught that cowardice and snivelling were all just tools to protect his own life.

"That's what Snape is afraid of Mon Amour. I've been taught that other than my family, nothing is more important than my life. If you were hauled before the Dark Lord or captured by Death Eaters I would do whatever I could to save you, and that would just result in us both being killed. Snape wants us both to learn how to endure pain and how to control our emotions and reactions so that if that happens, I could save you in a way that protects us both and means we both survive."

Draco watched Hermione frowned and realised that the idea of him trying to save her only to die in the trying bothered her. He knew when he saw that expression that though she didn't like it and certainly didn't agree with it, she would go through with the training so that they would both be able to think rationally even in the face of terror or blind rage.

"Are you ok Hermione?" Draco whispered to her as she took a few steps back and let her back rest against the wall of Snape's office. She heaved a heavy sigh as she leant there before she slowly turned her brown eyes on him. A small part of Draco was terrified that Hermione might decide he wasn't worth the trouble and the abuse and the lying, that she would grow tired of their situation and walk away from him.

He knew that their relationship had an expiry date, but her statement at her parents house in the holidays had given hope that even if they did have to walk away from each other, it might only have to be temporary. As he stared at her Draco let the roll of imaginary images of himself marrying Hermione Granger play behind his eyes and his heart squeezed painfully with fear that it would probably never become a reality.

"I hate your family" Hermione whispered to him sadly "I hate that you can't just switch sides… but I understand that there is no way around it. Sometimes it's hard for me not to beg you to abandon everything you know and abandon your family and just be with me…. but every time I start to think about it, I think about how I would feel if you asked me to walk away from my parents or from Harry and Ron and Ginny. I know I couldn't do it, especially if I knew that they would suffer and awful fate because it."

Hermione bit her lip for a moment as Draco stepped closer to her until he was less than a foot away from her. just as he moved to lean in and snog her until she forgot all her worrying for a little while she looked up into his eyes sadly.

"Will you please promise me something Draco?" Hermione asked him softly and Draco felt fear and unease curl in the pit of his stomach, dreading what she would ask of him. He raised his eyebrows at her, silently asking her to make her request without committing to promising it to her until he heard it.

"If there's a war and the dark side wins Harry will be dead. Ron and Ginny and the rest of the Weasley's will be too…. but if they're not…. If I'm somehow still alive and hauled in front of you and the Death Eaters along with any of them….. Draco promise me that you won't ask me to choose between them and you. Promise me you won't offer to save my life without trying to save theirs. If it happens and there is nothing you can do about it, promise me you'll let me die right along with them. Don't ever ask me to choose. Please?" Hermione whispered.

Draco stared at her. He already knew that if that ever happened he would do exactly that and try to save her life.

"And if you're alone? Am I allowed to save you then?" he asked her coldly, not at all liking her request since every time she asked him something a small part of him itched to give her everything she wanted.

"Of course, but if they are still alive somewhere, don't ask me to stay with you unless you intend to leave the Darkness. I already know that no matter what happens to me I'll to whatever I can to make sure the Light wins. Just promise me you won't ask me to choose between you and them."

Slowly Draco nodded, he knew in his heart that it was an empty promise, that he would break it if he could save her. "Ok. I won't ask you to choose me." He whispered, trying to keep from looking her right in the eyes as he said so. "But can I kiss you now?"

Hermione smiled at him slowly and stepped into his arms. Draco grinned as he bent to brush his lips teasingly across hers. He hated not being able to kiss her whenever he wanted, but the telepathic communication between them made it easier to deal with not spending every second with her after being together in the holidays. He hated the days he didn't have prefect duty with her because he couldn't just pull her to him and snog her senseless. Like yesterday in class when they been paired together in Ancient Runes; they had been at their usually table at the back of the classroom. Professor Babbling never bothered them there since they never had questions about their work and most of the other students sat further up.

Instead of having to work on problems together right away, Professor Babbling had given them an easy lesson and begun with a projected lecture. The pairings were permanent so Draco had already been sitting next to Hermione as Babbling dimmed the lights in the classroom and droned on about some Ancient Runes sites that had been uncovered by some wizards in the Amazon. Draco had been trying to pay attention to the lecture even though he'd already read about the discovery and was having trouble focusing with Hermione's perfume tormenting his nose. He hadn't expected it when his bushy haired witch had slipped her hand off the desk and rested it on his thigh. She hadn't looked at him, even when he'd glanced over at her incredulously. Instead she had begun to trail her hands up and down his legs, each time moving a little closer to his groin.

By the time the lesson was over Draco had had a raging hard on and his own hand up Hermione's skirt, though she'd been wearing tights. It had taken all of his restraint to keep from leaning over and nibbling on her earlobe, and even more to keep from bringing her off right there in the back of class. He'd ached to lean over and kiss her, as he had seen some of his classmates sneakily do. But he knew that if he had done it, someone would've caught them.

The feel of her tongue sweeping hungrily against his had Draco wishing they'd never left her parents house in London. Draco pressed her into the walls, deepening their kiss even as he thought about how much he wanted to drag her over to Snape's desk, lay her down and have his wicked way with her. he had no doubt that Snape probably knew they were still in his office and he didn't relish the idea of having his godfather catch him hooking up with Hermione, especially not laid out on Snape's desk.

When they came up for air Hermione was breathing heavily, and she looked at him with hungry eyes that begged him for more than just snogging. Draco smirked down at her smugly.

"Want to go relive the head boy and girl of patrol duty and stay up unreasonably late hooking up?" Hermione asked him cheekily. Draco grinned at her, thinking about where he might be able to take her where no one would find them while he made sweet love to the sexiest girl he'd ever laid eyes on. He nodded, reluctantly stepping away from her so they could leave the dungeons.

They walked in silence as they climbed the stair in search of the head boy and girl. Draco glanced at the girl beside him, thinking wicked thoughts when he spotted her chewing on her bottom lip. Suddenly something occurred to him and Draco pulled her to a stop behind a statue on the fourth floor. He snogged her for a minute before pulling back to ask her his question.

"Hermione, why did you ask me to promise not to make you choose between me and your friends?" her asked her softly. Leaning there in the darkness against the statue of some old crone Hermione peered up at him with wide eyes and a worried expression. For a long time she didn't answer and Draco thought she might not intend to. When she finally spoke, he was floored by her words.

"I asked you to never make me choose….. because a small part of me is terrified I'd pick you."


End file.
